Bizet was commissioned to write The Pearl Fishers (Les Pecheurs de Perles) when he was but 24, ten years before he went on to perturb the public with the passionate, murderous tragedy of Carmen, whose unforgettable melodies eventually made the opera a phenomenally successful hit to this day. The story of The Pearl Fishers is less powerful, well-rounded and hard-hitting than Carmen’s, even if you add in possible metaphors of pearls being things of beauty and desire that can lead to greed, obsession and exploitation, or something precious to be searched for and retrieved like precious lost memories. There’s a bizarre ending, too, with a fisherman sacrificing homes and children’s lives in a fire just to save his buddy and repay a service. Blame librettists Cormon and Carre for that. BUT… with exciting orchestration, fine melodies, a particularly exquisite aria and big choruses weaving the work through with lyrical beauty, drama and momentum in a production that’s relaxed, relaxing, intriguing and totally riveting, the flimsy story and ending don’t matter so much.
The original setting of pre-colonial, exoticised Ceylon (Sri Lanka) has been ditched. Written in 1863 when people had scant knowledge of the world outside their own small patch it never was too authentic. Exotic is, in fact, altogether out, while colour has been well and truly ditched in favour of monochrome grey and shades of perpetual gloom.
It’s shirts and trousers or dresses of funereal black for the whole huge chorus of village fisher folk who lurk like spectres in the darkness in an unreal location created by designers Joanna Parker and Peter Mumford, where unpolished pearls of different sizes fill the stage, looking like Sheffield-steel snooker ball sculptures – though without the shine, some big enough to hide behind – though unconvincingly. Tangles of thick, heavy ropes and net hang down as grey, lapping waves, pearly-grey frogspawn bubbles or grey rope knots float about soothingly behind in Mumford’s videoland.
Without distractions from flamboyant colour and spectacle, with no frenetic movement or demonstrative dramatising, the focus is fixed firmly on the colour and excitement in the music and singing itself. Even when the libretto tells us dancing and revelry is underway, all is largely stillness and immobility, the dark-clad chorus performing in synchronised stand-and-deliver mode with minimal movement and involvement other than in their voices, for which there is glorious scope.
The two pearl-fisher friends, Nadir and Zurga, have also ditched the fishing garb: while Nadir (Nico Darmanin) favours a long-haired, waist-coated, booted woodcutter look, stately, serious Zurga (Quirijin de Lang), the elected leader, prefers smart suit topped with long, blue silken dressing-gown a la Sherlock Holmes. In the back story narrative we learn that the two men have vowed an eternal fraternal friendship that will forever trump any infatuation for a women – especially their love for beautiful Leila, a priestess they once both fell for in the past. Et voila! would you believe it! Priestess Leila (Sophia Theodorides) turns up again right now, and the three are beset by conflicts of love, duty, friendship, loyalty and jealousy. Leila, her face not veiled and hidden as in the text, is in lacy, dusky pink and cream and bare-foot, standing out in the gloom that pervades all else until spotlit. The fourth character in the piece is high priest Nourabad, in whimsical bowler hat and tattered dark attire.
Fortunately, James Creswell’s positive presence and commanding tones dispel any notion that he’s strayed in from a set of Waiting For Godot.
Colossal hit of the opera is, of course, the sublime, heart-swelling tenor/baritone duet, Au Fond du Temple Saint, a pearl so exquisite Bizet uses it in echoes, forebodings and moments of sublime remembrance throughout the whole piece, and never does it pall. The singing of Darmanin and de Lang and the divine orchestration with floating flute and heavenly harp make it as lovely as ever, while Darmanin’s wonderful tone and expressive singing have his words take meaningful flight, too, in the lovely, Je crois entendre encore. Soprano Sophia Theodorides, on her ON debut as the bewitched, bothered and bewildered priestess, sings and “coloraturas” most pleasingly, and the duet of Leila and Nadir is particularly touching, their heads coming slowly, gently together only at the end of the song.
Contrary to what might be expected from a monochrome set that depicts a nowhere-or-anywhere land where there’s a minimum of physical drama and a chorus that’s largely static, this is a soothing, moving, very satisfying, highly enjoyable production.
Eileen Caiger Gray
The Pearl Fishers will also be performed, without full set and costumes, in Manchester, Gateshead, Hull and Nottingham. For more information follow this link.
