Carmen — a special staging celebrating 150 years of Bizet’s classic

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Bizet’s opera is everywhere this year but the Edinburgh International Festival has brought in a staging that is rather different and special. So it should be. It comes from Paris’s Opéra-Comique where Carmen premiered in 1875. That provides the director, Andreas Homoki, with his rather ingenious concept. His staging leaps by decades, act by act.
So the opening isn’t set in an army barracks in Seville. In fact there are no sets throughout. Instead we find a crowd of glamorous 1875 Parisian operagoers who seem to glide into the story. By the time we reach the third act smugglers, the costumes are 1940s. And for the final act we are in modern dress with everyone watching the bullfight on telly.
And there’s more — what is known as metatheatre, where the performers draw attention to the artifice of theatre. Sometimes the house lights go up and the cast notice we are watching them; sometimes a character leans forward and is startled to see there is an orchestra down there.
Add to that the use of curtains that probably mimic those of the Opéra-Comique in the 1870s, an old-fashioned prompt box and vaudeville-like use of a spotlight to highlight solo numbers and it becomes clear that this is not just another production of Carmen. It is a homage to the opera’s 150-year performance history.
If all that sounds a tad intellectual and, well, very French, it doesn’t feel like it because the work is staged like a real opera comique with charm, elegance and plenty of humour. And thanks to an outstanding Carmen, Gaëlle Arquez, the drama never feels lightweight. What a revelation to have a native French speaker and a terrific actress singing this role. The nuances, scorn and irony she puts into the dialogue, the classy way she shapes her solos — along with an attitude to men that’s rather like a cat toying with an irritating parade of mice — all that makes her characterisation gripping.
With Saimir Pirgu singing robustly as José, Jean-Fernand Setti magnificently imposing as Escamillo and Elbenita Kajtazi unusually assertive as Micaela, it is a real ensemble effort. And the Scottish Chamber Orchestra enters into the historical spirit too with some very Gallic-sounding period brass instruments, though the plodding speeds imposed on some famous numbers by the conductor, Louis Langrée, seem overindulgent for such a crisply paced staging. ★★★★☆180minTo Aug 8, eif.co.uk