Barlett Sher’s Tales of Hoffmann revival at the Met loses the emotional core of this complex opera

United States Offenbach, Les contes d’Hoffmann: Soloists, Chorus and Orchestra of the Metropolitan Opera / Marco Armiliato (conductor). Broadcast Live in HD from the Metropolitan Opera, New York, to Cineworld Basildon, Essex, 5.10.2024. (JPr)

Perhaps I am still seeing more than I think I am because I didn’t immediately recall I had watched Bartlett Sher’s The Tales of Hoffmann until I did a search and it reveal I reviewed an original 2009 Met performance (more recently online) and a later Live in HD cinema showing in 2015. I wrote then how ‘I have rarely enjoyed opera at the cinema more than this Les contes d’Hoffmann – and realisation also dawned while I was watching it (if we ignore my penchant for Wagner) that this work must be one of my favourites.’

Well, it still is a favourite and that’s why I was there (again apparently!) in 2024 but on this occasion, I did not enjoy it as much as I was hoping to. I began to see more of the flaws in the opera and the production. In brief, I experienced too much stopping of the story for big set pieces – whether individual or ensemble ones – and there was a lack of stage magic which this Offenbach’s tale demands.

The composer created a number of issues for a conductor and director as he never lived to see Hoffmann performed. Offenbach had a premonition that like one of Hoffmann’s three loves, Antonia, he would die before finishing it. Indeed, four months before its first performance he died with the piano score completed and only the Prologue and Act I orchestrated. As a result, different completions soon emerged, some with little resemblance to Offenbach’s perceived vision. The version performed at the premiere of Hoffmann was by Ernest Guiraud, who completed the scoring and wrote recitatives for the original spoken dialogue.

Over the years new editions have emerged striving for ‘authenticity’ (it will be very interesting to see what The Royal Opera perform at Covent Garden in November). Often there is some extra Offenbach music not intended for this particular opera in the Giulietta act: this includes ‘Scintille, diamant’ whose tune derives from the overture to the operetta A Journey to the Moon and a Sextet (sometimes called a Septet, involving the chorus as a character). In the current Met version – which I believe was cobbled together by former music director James Levine from existing sources for the new production in 2009 – both of these are included.

Also creating much debate is the sequence of the acts: apart from a Prologue and Epilogue there are three acts, telling different stories from Hoffmann’s life. They are basically independent (though Olympia is mentioned in the Antonia act) and can be swapped without changing the overall story. Offenbach’s order – as presented here – was Prologue–Olympia–Antonia–Giulietta–Epilogue.

Relying again on what I have written before, I still find Bartlett Sher’s stage imagery complex. He repeated in 2024 how – together with his team – he created ‘a decadent world of the 1920s’. Initially most of Catherine Zuber’s costumes indeed suggest we are somewhere in Europe between the two world wars, though Paris features heavily with ballerinas in rose-pink tutus representing Olympia, all the pasty-faced clowns with red noses, some mime artists, as well as, long-legged chorus girls in black Victoria’s Secret-like lingerie straight from Le Crazy Horse Saloon. However, Benjamin Bernheim’s Hoffmann just wears a simple suit, and Christian Van Horn wears a black leather duster coat for all his devilish ‘bad angel’ incarnations. Without any wigs both look as if they had wandered onto the stage from modern-day New York.

Kafka is there in Sher’s Broadway-style approach and so is Magritte with the bowler hats and giant eyes; there is a Felliniesque orgy in decadent Venice and much more. There are also references to French and German Expressionist cinema and what looks like the female robot from Fritz Lang’s Metropolis at the back during the Olympia act. Whilst there is no doubting the tremendous imagination, style and wit on show, I thought Gina Lapinski’s revival lost the emotional core of this complex opera.

Hoffmann spends much of his time at a small table with its old typewriter. The Muse of Poetry – who transforms herself into his devoted friend, Nicklausse, the ‘good angel’ – believes that this is where he should stay because being in love will only distract him from his poetry. Nicklausse becomes central to all the tales Hoffmann retells. At the start the poet is infatuated with Stella who is singing in Mozart’s Don Giovanni at the opera house and Luther’s tavern next door is the only place where Hoffmann seems at home. Urged on by some sozzled students, during the Prologue Hoffmann sings his ballad about the dwarf Kleinzach – which is probably not really PC for 2024 – as are mentions of a bankrupt Jew Elias in the first act, although Offenbach was himself Jewish.

After the Prologue, Hoffmann broods on his three previous romantic obsessions which all ended badly. Is what we see in vino veritas or just something the poet has made up. Possibly the latter, as characters and images are jumbled right from the moment the curtain opens for the start of the opera with some reappearing through the remaining acts, especially the half-naked showgirls and the Olympia-lookalike ballerinas.

Ideally any production of Hoffmann would adhere to Offenbach’s instruction for one soprano to sing all three previous love interests plus his current inamorata Stella, with one bass-baritone portraying all four of Hoffmann’s nemeses. Here – as too often these days now – we get the latter but not the former.

Rolando Villazón remains the best Hoffmann I have ever seen when singing the role at Covent Garden in 2008 and his über-romantic protagonist verged on credible erotomania. Here celebrated French tenor Benjamin Bernheim suffered all the slings and (Cupid’s) arrows of unrequited or requited passion with impressive stoicism, a certain savoir faire, and, for me, too little charisma. From the Prologue’s drinking song onwards, there was no doubting Bernheim’s exquisite phrasing; he spins a lovely line and is the epitome of vocal lyricism, however, I wanted more. Nevertheless, when Hoffmann brutally despatched Schlemil (Jeongcheol Cha) in Act III all his character’s previously repressed anger at the vicissitudes of his (love)life came to the fore very convincingly.

Bass-baritone Christian Van Horn brought a commanding and demonic stage presence to his villainous roles (Lindorf/Coppélius/Dr Miracle/Dappertutto). Erin Morley was the perfect ‘living doll’ with all her jerky mechanical movement and some formidable note-perfect coloratura for ‘Les oiseaux dans la charmille’ ending with the ornamentation she has adopted from her idol Natalie Dessay with its high G above high C. Pretty Yende was an appropriately haughty divaish Stella and an affecting, melancholic, housebound Antonia who Dr Miracle encourages to sing though they both know it can only end in her death. Clémentine Margaine brought the required voluptuousness in personality and voice to Giulietta, a courtesan so irresistible that she can steal Hoffmann’s reflection (soul).

Nicklausse is pivotal to all five parts of Hoffmann; as she is, at differing times, a companion, confidant, defender, someone who pre-empts certain events, and – possibly throughout – Stella’s romantic rival for Hoffmann’s heart as she often encourages the villain in ending the poet’s current romantic escapade. Russian mezzo-soprano Vasilisa Berzhanskaya’s portrayal of Nicklausse was not as androgynous as some might show ‘him’ in 2024 but it was still a compelling performance with Berzhanskaya’s highlight being the second act ‘C’est l’amour vainqueur’ when Nicklausse cautions Hoffmann to appreciate that artistic love surpasses romantic love.

Elsewhere, Aaron Blake provided much-needed comic relief as Frantz, the hard-of-hearing servant of Antonia’s stern – yet despairing – father, Crespel (the excellent Bardley Garvin). Blake also had three other minor roles: Andrès (Stella’s servant), Cochenille (Spalanzani’s servant) and Pitichinaccio (one of Giulietta’s many admirers).

The Met’s chorus of waiters and eager students – under their new director Tilman Michael – revelled as ever in the Prologue’s drinking song whilst Dou Dou Huang’s crotch-stretching choreography for the showgirls enhanced the Venice Carnival-like atmosphere of the third act. Just as apt, though in an entirely different way, was his enchanting choreography for the Act I mechanical dolls.

Important to the success of the musical side of this performance was Marco Armiliato conducting the always reliable Met orchestra for the 500th time. Armiliato said of the edition of the score the Met uses as ‘the most complete and nice’ and how he feels ‘comfortable with this version’. I believe all the musicians and singers had a shared love for an opera the conductor said was ‘a little step down’ from being a masterpiece. There were moments of the sparkling effervescent lightness so typical of French opéra comique and the dramatic intensity we recognise from composers such as Verdi or Wagner; even if, it didn’t entirely gel for me this time.

Jim Pritchard

Production:
Production – Bartlett Sher
Revival Stage director – Gina Lapinski
Set designer – Michael Yeargan
Costume designer – Catherine Zuber
Lighting designer – James F Ingalls
Choreographer – Dou Dou Huang
Chorus director – Tilman Michael

Cast:
Hoffmann – Benjamin Bernheim
Olympia – Erin Morley
Stella / Antonia – Pretty Yende
Giulietta – Clémentine Margaine
Lindorf / Coppélius / Dr Miracle / Dappertutto – Christian Van Horn
Nicklausse / Muse – Vasilisa Berzhanskaya
Andrès / Cochenille / Frantz / Pitichinaccio – Aaron Blake
Luther / Crespel – Bradley Garvin
Nathanaël / Spalanzani – Tony Stevenson
Hermann / Schlemil – Jeongcheol Cha
Antonia’s mother – Eve Gigliotti

Live in HD Director – Gary Halvorson
Live in HD Host – Ben Bliss