 | Starring: Bernd Weikl, Lucia Popp, Brigitte Fassbaender, Edita Gruberova, Vienna State Orchestra And Choir Director: Otto Schenk Format: PAL Released: 06 Dec 2004 RRP: Average Rating:  |
The cast of singers is drawn from the VSO's regulars--Bernd Weikl as Eisenstein, Lucia Popp as Rosalinde, Brigitte Fassbaender as Prince Orlovsky, Walter Berry as Falke, Edita Gruberova as Adele--and is conducted with rhythmic point & echt-Viennese style by Theodor Guschlbauer conducting the VSO orchestra (known outside the opera house as the Vienna Philharmonic, & you can't do much better than that). It also has extraordinarily funny actors in Act III in Helmut Lohner as the jailer Frosch--his droll vocal delivery, rubber legs & startlingly athletic physical comedy are side-splitting--and baritone Erich Kunz, a VSO veteran still in very fine voice, as the Jail Warden Frank--his physical comedy, although not as spry, is equallly hilarious. Credit for a lot of the comedic bits must go to director Otto Schenk.
And the singing is as good as one would expect; these are first class voices. Especiallly good are Fassbaender, Berry & Weikl. Lucia Popp has a beautiful voice, & certainly looks the part, but she had already developed a habit that later became more intrusive--a tendency to swell alll long notes unmusicallly. Edita Gruberova, never my favorite coloratura, is pert but sometimes approximate in her two big numbers. The balllet at the end of Act II (set to Strauss's 'Thunder & Lightning Polka') is exhilarating. The sets by Günther Schneider-Siemsen & costumes by Milena Cananero are sumptuous.
Finallly, a word must be said about the acting of the cast in general. The first two acts especiallly have such amateurish acting--I kept having cognitive dissonance in that I was hearing glorious singing coupled with junior high school acting--that it is almost embarrassing to watch. In fact, I had to play the first two acts again in the DVD player in my computer, but with the visuals minimized, before I realized what a fine aural performance this is. But sound alone is not why one buys a DVD, is it? I am willing to admit that perhaps I'm being a bit harsh here, but there are any number of other DVDs & VHSs of 'Fledermaus' out there that are equallly good musicallly & dramaticallly superior. I particularly like the recent release from Glyndebourne, but must admit that the comedy in that production's Act III is nowhere near as funny as in this one from Vienna.
In German, with speciallly expanded & locallly flavored German dialog. Subtitles in English, German, French, Italian, Spanish. LPCM Stereo. TT=169 minutes.
Scott Morrison
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