Czech National Ballet has followed the example of Paris and Milan by renaming Kenneth MacMillan’s classic story-telling ballet as L’Histoire de Manon. In staging this new production for Prague, former Royal Ballet principal, Robert Tewsley (working with notator, Yuri Uchiumi) has returned to MacMillan’s first principles to enrich the narrative with several details that appear to have been worn away from the Covent Garden production after years of revivals. The outcome is like meeting Manon’s twin sister, just as beautiful and yet even more fascinating.
The original Nicholas Georgiadis designs would not fit the smaller stage of Prague’s State Opera House and so a new design concept has been created by Cinzia Lo Fazio (who has worked with the MacMillan Foundation since 2010). Most of her new scenography works well, such as in the opening courtyard scene although there is no room for Manon to arrive on a coach and the women prisoners are not transported on a tumbril (instead, being tied together with heavy rope).
Georgiadis’ multi-purpose, decrepit thematic is respected although with a broken-window motif replacing the hanging rags, which fails the relevance test when doubling up for the mangroves in Louisiana (broken windows in a swamp)! Jacopo Pantani’s innovative lighting seems mostly to come from high above the proscenium and Natalia Stewart’s experience as a costume supervisor at the Royal Opera House lends context to her costume designs that are both familiar to the London production and replete with period relevance.
The opening night Manon was danced delightfully by Romina Contreras, a Chilean ballerina who built upon prior experience of having danced the role in Santiago (albeit almost a decade ago). She danced enchantingly and was unafraid to take risks in her passionate duets with Danilo Lo Monaco, an impressive and noble Des Grieux. Contreras expressed the vagaries in Manon’s capricious character with a soulful, dramatic command.
Lescaut was performed artfully by Paul Irmatov, impressively breaking the desk in Des Grieux’s lodgings when he is thrown onto the stage by the irate and injured Monsieur G.M. after the card-cheating episode. Irmatov seemed a little too dashing for the conniving Lescaut (who sells his sister to the highest bidder) and his forte came when giving a dignified and charming portrayal as Des Grieux in a later performance. In other casts, Matěj Šust and Francesco Scarpato both brought a satisfying level of cunning bravado to the role of Lescaut.
Aya Okumura was technically superb as Lescaut’s mistress, dancing her challenging, coquettish solos in Acts 1 and 2 with excellent pointework and rock-solid balances. At the second premiere, on the following evening, she debuted as Manon with a thoroughly satisfying performance. Her Des Grieux was Federico Ievoli in another agreeable and empathetic portrayal of the idealistic student. Each of the trio portraying Des Grieux managed that fiendishly difficult opening solo of slow balances, turns and arabesques – where Des Grieux declares his love for Manon – by combining robust technique with romantic expression.
Lescaut’s mistress in Okumura’s cast was Alina Nanu who then, continuing this mix-and-match casting, gave her own sensational performance as Manon, alongside Irmatov, with Nina Fernandes emphasising the empathetic qualities of the mistress.
As Monsieur G.M. on the opening night, Marek Svobodník was a strutting, sleazy, lascivious, abusive narcissist, an attitude he retained even through the curtain call! If there were an Oscar® for best supporting actor in ballet, then his tempestuous expression of evil would be hard to beat, and that is also recognising the fact that both Giovanni Rotolo and John Powers were each excellent in their own different interpretations of the role. Rotolo was also a menacing, arrogant Gaoler as was Tudor Moldoveanu. This revitalised production possesses a heightened erotic frisson, whether in G.M’s lecherous foot-fetishist desire for Manon, her rape by the Gaoler, or in the various sexual antics of the bordello scene.
Martin Yates – who reworked the original score for Manon, in 2011 – spent five weeks with the State Opera’s orchestra rehearsing his arrangement before conducting each of these performances. This unique personal preparation achieved a rich orchestral articulation of the romance and drama in Massenet’s music.
The ballet requires a huge supporting cast and Tewsley has done a superb job in encouraging every single performer to invest a personality into their background character and these vignettes were attracting the eye all over the stage during the crowd scenes that opened each act. In the episode where Manon dances her beguiling solo in the hôtel particulier and the whole background cast freezes, I noticed that they stopped in wholly different tableaux at each performance.
This production refreshed my experience of Manon and rekindled my admiration for MacMillan’s unique ability to make story-telling ballets on a grand scale. It is wonderful to see that Manon (or her twin sister) has found yet another, hopefully permanent, home in Prague.
Graham's trip was funded by Czech National Ballet
