Les pêcheurs de perles, composed when Georges Bizet was 25, has a spotty reputation. It features a pair of perennially popular numbers, but many seasoned opera-goers dismiss it as an immature work with a paint-by-numbers libretto. The writers themselves, Eugène Cormon and Michel Carré, admitted that their Orientalist mash of pagodas, veils and fakirs was inadequate. The plot, like that of Bellini’s Norma, features a love triangle quadrangled by religious vows. Both chief pearl fisher Zurga and hunter Nadir are in love with Leïla, a Hindu priestess who swears to protect a village in Ceylon with her chaste prayers. Like Norma, the opera ends in a conflagration, but it is the village that burns, not the sacrilegious lovers. His love unrequited, Zurga commits arson to allow Leïla and his old friend Nadir to escape the vengeful mob. Bizet’s love music is sheer melodic genius, but the most entrancing melodies occur in the first two acts; the dramatic climax in Act III is considerably less inspired. Nevertheless, its great lyrical beauty has earned the work a place in the repertoire.
The Nederlandse Reisopera’s production does away with Oriental specifics and concentrates on the interaction between the leads, dressed by Elena Warner in patchwork costumes with vaguely Asian silhouettes. The chorus of villagers wears contemporary clothes. Wikke van Houwelingen’s set surrounds the characters by the elements that rule their lives, its main feature being a cloth backdrop curled like a wave. A full moon shines on Leïla and Nadir's night of love and a twelve-disc sun blazes on the morning of their disgrace.
Timothy Nelson's staging comprises several good ideas that, mainly through overuse, often get in each other's way. A large net, dragged, twisted and wound throughout the performance, represents the emotional entanglement of the main characters. Three athletic dancers double the ménage à trois, pushing and rolling off each other in a mix of traditional Thai steps and Western modern dance. The dancers worked best when they gave shape to the singers' emotions in the public scenes, by pulling them apart, for example, but were less effective when echoing the singers during the arias and duets. The concave backdrop encompassed the trio's inner life: in it they sometimes revealed their feelings instead of being their public selves. Unfortunately, the visual clues signalling entry into this inner space were not always clear. Leïla arrived at the village unveiled and tenderly kissed both Nadir and Zurga, visualising the men's past encounters with her, real or imaginary. Since Zurga only discovers Leïla's identity after she betrays her vows, this scene created plot confusion. The inner space concept was most successful when the soloists were physically separated from the chorus, who had little to do except stand in rows, such as when the villagers appeared as shadows behind the curved curtain.