SITE RATING: 8/10
SITE REVIEW:
Jean-Christophe
Spinosi's startling, avant-garde staging of Handel's Messiah is one of
the freshest, most thought-provoking productions of the oratorio to
ever be produced. Each chorus and aria receives its own
unique
placement, with the singers doubling as actors in what appears to be a
Brechtian dystopia. The bleak, Orwellian grayness which
pervades
the costumes and scenery carries over into the cold, detached manner of
the performers, which unfortunately casts a pall over the music.
Staged by Claus Guth, there's a pronounced disconnect between
the
text and the action on stage: stone-faced jurors in courtrooms; small
apartments attended by broken relationships; large, empty corridors
with noirish shadows falling on the walls; gaping amphitheaters
stylistically connect the pieces, but there's no attempt by the
creative team to breathe any direct meaning into Handel's masterwork;
it's almost as if you're hearing one performance and seeing a different
one. Regardless of the producers' monkey-wrenching the
meaning of Messiah,
it's a
beautifully performed piece, with the Arnold Schoenberg Choir
remarkably clean and unified - even when their performing movement
along with their singing, and the soloists uniformly excellent. It's
also wonderfully filmed - one of the best-looking Messiahs on video,
and I found myself captured by the visuals as much as the music.
Not a Messiah
that will leave you with a warm feeling, but rather a wide-eyed
admiration for its impressively icy ideals.
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