Monday evening, December 13, around 11 p.m. at the Opéra Comique in Paris. The room is delirious, the ovation uninterrupted. The applause does not end to raise to the skies the two leading roles, Pene Patti and Perrine Madoeuf, hero of a Romeo and Juliet of Gounod saved from the waters. Itinerary of a triumph, to say the least, unexpected.
Because the premiere of Gounod’s opera is shaping up to be very bad auspices. The day before, the tenor Jean-François Borras to play Romeo, tested positive for Covid, must forfeit. The next day (therefore the day of the performance), it is the turn of Julia Fuchs, her Juliette – and expected star of this new production – to cancel her participation for the same reason. That’s not all. In the orchestra, the brass section is also affected. And replaced at the last minute. But should we really maintain the representation? The arrival of Pene Pati from Amsterdam, where he has just completed a Traviata and that of Perrine Madoeuf on the same day (!) in Riga where she still played her role of Juliet a few days ago, resolve the situation. We are considering a moment to blackmail the entire masked cast. Before finally limiting himself to the choir.
“Fasten your seatbelts”, jokes the new director of the Opéra Comique Louis Langrée, who takes the stage to announce the changes to the public, in complete transparency. And aware of the challenge, because the complicity of the two lovers of Verona usually requires “months of preparation”, he continues. “There, they had an afternoon to get to know each other!”. The die is cast. And the miracle happens.
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Long enough to find her marks in such a singular situation, Lyon soprano Perrine Madoeuf quickly won the support of the public. With her beautiful tone and solid voice, she charms her world with the waltz Ah, I want to live in the dream that intoxicates me, real tube intoned without primers. But she has yet to meet her love. In the following act, the tenor from Samoa already expresses his amorous happiness in another very beautiful tune, Ah, get up sun, which is applauded for almost a minute. Pene Pati is a divine surprise: his big rugby player size shelters a generous voice and powerful projection, as well as great ease, especially in his subtle highs.
Encouraged by the public, the meeting of the two makes sparks. A joyous and serious meeting, because the lovers come from two hereditary enemy families, the Capulets and the Montagues, and tragedy awaits. Seized by love at first sight, Romeo-Pene Patti overwhelms with his Adorable angel followed by the Calm your fears by Juliette – Perrine Madoeuf. The amorous duo works, their complicity increases a notch with the balcony scene and the exchange of oaths after a very nice “Tell me honestly I love you” sent by Juliet to Romeo. As a whole, the whole distribution of Romeo and Juliet is remarkable. Special mention to bass Patrick Bolleire (a brother Laurent serious and reassuring at the same time) and baritone Jérôme Boutillier (father Capulet, statuary).
On the stage of the Opéra Comique, the energy of the singers and their characters sweeps away everything in its path like a whirlwind. A tempo that we owe to the dynamic direction of Laurent Campellone – at the head of the Orchester de l’Opéra de Rouen Normandie – but also and above all to the staging of Eric Ruf who has adapted here the device that ‘he had used for Shakespeare’s play at the Comédie-Française in 2015. His credo, to account for the dazzling story of Romeo and Juliet which holds in just a few days: their meeting, their love, their tragic destiny .
Result, a direction of actors which offers a perpetual movement of the singers (the soloists and the Accentus choir) and a fluidity of the decorations, imposing sections of movable white walls creating a different atmosphere to each scene. The atmosphere is that of southern Italy with its decayed facades hinting at the richness of yesteryear, which is reminiscent of the photographic series Spirit of the Ruins by Ferrante Ferranti.
Two beautiful paintings imagined by the director perfectly illustrate the switch between joy and drama. The first is the scene of struggle between the two families. On either side of the stage, men in brown shirts and felt hats screwed to their heads face each other, armed with knives in a dazzling choreography. A West Side Story gang war that keeps the public spellbound and that Eric Ruf associates with “Italy of vendetta where revenge and death are left behind”, as it specifies in the room program.
The other scene is the finale of the tomb. Beautiful and terrifying painting in which Romeo joins Juliet, apparently dead, in a vault inspired by the catacombs of Palermo where the bodies are rightly placed upright. As if to evoke the fine line between life and death. And the last duo of Romeo and Juliet (yet dying) to underline it: “Come, let’s flee to the end of the world, come, let’s be happy!”.