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Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9786305908715
Format: Classical, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
ISBN: 6305908710
Label: Image Entertainment
Manufacturer: Image Entertainment
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Image Entertainment
Region Code: 1
Release Date: August 15, 2000
Running Time: 105 minutes
Sales Rank: 30125
Studio: Image Entertainment
Theatrical Release Date: 1989
Editorial Review:
Description:
With neat, plain building-block designs by Jacques Rapp, Louis Erlo's energetically-staged production of Prokofiev's surreal fairy-tale for the Lyon Opera is full of cartoon characters and swift farce. Based on a play by Carlo Gozzi, 'L'Amour des Trois Oranges' tells the story of a doleful, hypochondriac Prince, who can only be cured through laughter. When he breaks into hysterics at the expense of the evil witch Fata Morgana, she curses him. His fate is to fall in love with three oranges. Speed and good humor make the stage bristle with life and Erlo's sunny conception is typified by the Prince, less an effete neurotic as Jean-Luc Viala plays him, than a pure Danny DeVito figure, pear-shaped and peppery. One of Prokofiev's running jokes is the warring camps of opera-lovers who keep wanting to intervene from beyond the proscenium and Erlo realizes this conceit very effectively, with the Lyon chorus clambering in and out of stage boxes and eventually invading the onstage action. Even the King, the great French bass Gabriel Bacquier, makes his entrance as a bumbling latecomer amid the front stalls. 105 minutes.
Amazon.com:
The ostensible subject of Prokofiev's surrealistic comedy The Love for Three Oranges is a fairy tale similar to Mozart's The Magic Flute: a prince on a quest for a beautiful princess with whom he has fallen in love from a distance; villains of horrifying (though comic) nastiness; magic charms and enchantments (for example, the princess is turned into a rat); and a titanic struggle between the forces of good and evil. But in its subtext, it is an opera about opera, beginning with a near-riot. The chorus is divided into two groups--opera patrons in tuxedos demanding a serious drama and stage hands in working clothes who insist on a comedy.
In one dimension, this work is a discussion of operatic styles and conventions, and this is the level on which the Opera de Lyon production triumphs most decisively. Its style is self-consciously brilliant, as it should be. The performers' acting style is as important as their voices, and they have refined every verbal nuance, every gesture, to perfection, including a lot of pure slapstick. This opera, in this production, will appeal particularly to two types of audience: sophisticates who will relish its subtexts, parodies, insider jokes, and chic staging, and children who will be attracted by the story of a prince (son of the King of Clubs) who angers a witch and suffers a terrible curse: he will fall hopelessly in love with three oranges. --Joe McLellan
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - Farcical Fun
This staging of "LfTO" is spare and modernistic, with minimal (but often inventive) sets and costumes, but the singing is first-rate and Nagano's conducting makes for an excellent handling of the music. The cast is young and vibrant (and even a bit sexy!) and the camera work helps keep you involved. A must if you are a Prokofiev fan; but it might be an eye-roller for someone looking for more traditional opera.
Rating:  - Wow
Amazing. Over-arching power and detail, not only in the main roles but everyone who is on stage all the time. Worth the search.
Rating:  - Eh...not my favorite.
I was actually kind of surprised....I wasn't really expecting how different this was going to be. To put it quite plainly, porcelein dolls scare the living heck out of me, so it's not my cup of tea. I'm more prone to the classical ballet scene...but I suppose that is just me. Really good on most terms, but on terms of the freakiness, I'll have to give it a 10...
Rating: - complete but...
less brilliant than the French version, Gergev is not always a great deal.
Martin
Rating: - subtitles missing
There is no way to turn the subtitles on and I have bought 2 DVDs at this point and neither of them have working subtitles. Outside of that is a suberb performance. No company is better than Opera Lyon's at this type of production.
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