Carmen

This epic telling of Carmen, staged on Sydney Harbour, in surely the world’s most spectacular outdoor setting, is the first OA Handa production to be revived.  And with good reason.  The Gale Edwards 2013 production may be an edited version of Bizet’s original but it conjures all the fireworks, colour and vivid impact you expect of an Event Opera. 

Its setting in Franco’s Spain circa 1940’s well serves the ever simmering threat in Carmen of male violence and worker rebellion.  And it’s a perfect excuse for Julie Lynch’s fabulous Hollywood period costumes and those exaggerated flounces also well matched to Bizet’s pseudo Spanish score. 

Kelley Abbey’s dynamic choreography, so vitally filling this arena stage, similarly picks up the theme, reworking flamenco and other Spanish struts with a touch of West Side Story.

Designer Brian Thomson flies in by crane the odd lorry, tank or bulk container to underpin the industrial and military settings, and on scaffolding walkways behind are the huge red-lit back-facing letters, CARMEN.  Alternating with the outline of a bull, this nicely conjures the world outside the bullring and – like Hollywood – the real backstage story behind the sign.  To say nothing of great Event branding!

John Rayment’s lighting palette shifts slowly from moody shadowing to a riot of colours, the main action etched in spots to steer our focus. And through 223 speakers, Tony David Cray delivers miraculously well-balanced sound, including from conductor Brian Castles-Onion and his 44 musicians thundering away underneath the stage.

And then there’s the cast of 78, principals, chorus singers, dancers and actors all artfully choreographed through speedy scene changes.  

Jose Maria Lo Monaco may be small but is a viper vocally and physically as Carmen; Andreka Gorrotxategi is affecting as her shy and then vengeful lover Don Jose; Natalie Aroyan sings powerfully as the adoring village girl who still follows him, while Luke Gabbedy is suitably rock star as the matador who wins away the spirited Carmen.

In this arena, subtleties of character and motivation are lost to the sky – the acting more postural and in motion than intimately observed. The biggest applause goes to the creatives who were backstage framing all this excitement.

Martin Portus

Images: Jose Maria Lo Monaco as Carmen and Luke Gabbedy as Escamillo and the cast of Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour. Photographer: Prudence Upton.