Premiere: 25.02.22
Claude Debussy
Budapest State Opera
Staging by Hotel Pro forma
Director: Kirsten Dehlholm
Co-director and artistic collaborator: Marie Dahl
Set Design: Maja Ziska
Light Design: Jesper Kongshaug
Video design: Adam Ryde Ankarfeldt
Costume design: Marta Twarowska
Pelléas et Mélisande, 1902, is Claude Debussy’s only opera, based on the symbolist play by Maurice Maeterlinck. The Hungarian State Opera commissioned a staging by Hotel Pro Forma for a new stage in Budapest in 2022.
The opera tells the story of the doomed love between the young prince Pelléas and the unknown girl Melisande, found all alone in the woods. The main theme is the cycle of creation and destruction, fate and love.The staging concept interprets the marriage of the young Mélisande to the much older prince Golaud as an act that starts a spiral of destruction. Forces are in motion, which the characters are controlled by. Almost like a chamber play, it is a universe closed off from the outside world where the characters try to navigate and avoid the predestined outcome. The characters have no innate qualities. Hardly aware of their choices they become reactions to each other’s actions. In the center is Mélisande, placed in the classic female role as trigger and sacrifice in a story about men.
The scenography underlines a story driven by fate with moving elements, which the characters must navigate amongst. From the ceiling hangs a big flat oval turning around itself (1. Part), a big rotating drop-shaped pendulum (2. Part), as well as swings and a hanging bed. The performers are mainly positioned on the double, revolving stage, where they as bodies are static but simultaneously moved about in endless circles. The floor is covered by 100 transparent glass balls, catching the light and inhibiting the performers as they move slowly around. The story’s symbols are shown as video projections, presented in the form of an encyclopedia.
