We were particularly excited to see Parsifal this past week at the Met—as both Jonas Kaufmann and Rene Pape are in it and the production was getting rave reviews. And the Met’s Parsifal did not disappoint. This was my first time seeing Parsifal and Shawn’s first time seeing any Wagner opera and so we went into the evening with very few preconceived expectations.
The Met was packed to capacity, and the audience was abuzz with anticipation. We felt a touch of this before Elisir with Netrebko, but the expectation was far more palpable at Parsifal. The audience expected great things and it felt like they could turn ugly if disappointed.
As the shimmering water-like curtain rose on Act One, two groups of people wandered the raked stage as a close up of a sky and later the surface of the moon glowed in the background. One group of singers wore dark jackets and formal white shirts, the others were in all dark clothing. As the music progressed, those in white shirts slowly took off their jackets, shoes and socks and eventually formed a barefoot yet formal seated circle. At the same time, those in all black moved around the stage, gradually converging into a tight clump. The end result was a ball of people clad in black on the upper portion of the left stage and on the lower right was a seated circle of white shirted men. I was struck by this image and dark versus light was a visual theme throughout the opera.
As a graduate of Catholic school, I found the obvious Christ references throughout the opera interesting—which makes sense as it is about the Holy Grail and is based on the Arthurian story—but I also noticed that the production referenced other religions. There was a yin and yang-like formation at the beginning of the opera (Taoist) and yoga poses by the Knights (Buddhism/Hinduism). I could swear I saw Knights standing in warrior 1 and 2 at different points in Act One. The formal white shirted Knights also sat in a broad open circle, while the darker characters were in a tight ball. The darkly dressed characters would fit perfectly within the Knights’ circle—as with yin and yang, they seem connected and complementary, part of the same.
While I was busy finding the religion in Wagner, Shawn became fascinated with Gurnemanz telling the backstory to how he knows Klingsor. As a cinephile, it was noticeable that the main tenet of screenwriting, “Show Don’t Tell” was not being followed. In film, large sections of expository dialogue or voice over means one has failed as a screenwriter. Here, Gurnemanz spent a good 30 minutes telling us the backstory to Klingsor—essentially just statically standing on stage and talking/singing to us. This is true of all opera to some degree but it somehow struck my companion particularly here. Also, there was not a vocal line as he is accustomed to hearing them. A line of course, but very foreign to his ear at first. But we both found it captivating regardless. In fact, there were entire periods throughout the opera where we both felt as if we may have actually dozed off or drifted away from the action, but upon later reflection we felt bizarrely mesmerized by the music and voices and had been following the entire time in an kind of altered quasi-hypnotic state. Suspended in a strange dreamy Wagner Twilight Zone. It was quite exhilarating in a relaxing kind of way. It reminded me of a Mass, the solemn music, the slow deliberate movements and combination of sounds and images designed to create an altered state of communing with God in the participants. In fact, some of the phrases and tunes were ones I recognized from attending mass at Catholic school. It was a heady experience.
The first intermission definitely brought us back to earth after being in the timeless magical land of Monsalvat. We had champagne and a sandwich next to a man in full leather—hat with chain, sleeveless vest, chaps AND boots. He rocked. Opera really is for everyone. Especially for Leather Men, if you really think about it.
For Act II the stage was completely transformed—a giant pool of blood, ankle deep, filled most of the stage. Standing in it were about 20 women all with long dark hair and white dresses, standing against or connected to a forest of spears. It was the lair of the auto-castrated Klingsor, a rejected Knight of the Grail. As Gurnemanz told us earlier, Klingsor was refused entry to the Knights of the Grail. In an attempt to rid himself of impure thoughts, Klingsor castrated himself and the Knights rejected his application for admittance. Enraged by rejection, Klingsor turned to the “dark arts,” created a dark kingdom of his own and dedicated himself to destroying the Knights. While a bit grossed out, I have to admit that I enjoyed the balls of blood projected onto the back wall of the stage. It had a lava lamp look and constantly reminded me of what Klingsor had done to himself in his quest for “purity”. The blood everywhere was a great effect, though it did distract me and make me wonder how much one bleeds after self-castration. A lot I would imagine. Evgeny Nikitin, with all the recent press about his tattoos and off stage activities, fit Klingsor perfectly for me. And vocally he was riveting although it did strike me how small the role was compared to the other leads.
I must confess I got a bit confused during Act II. How did Parsifal get to Klingsor’s damned world? How did he know to go there? And how did he know what to do when he got there? Also did Kundry turn into his dead mother in an attempt to seduce him? In any event, Act II was great, with Parsifal freezing Klingsor and the now bloodied flower maidens (from wading through the water) and taking the spear on his way back to help the injured Amfortas. Something about Parsifal freezing the castrated Klingsor and taking his spear spoke to me visually.
In Act III Parsifal returns to the Knights of the Holy Grail, and he has his feet washed by Kundry which again resonated with my Catholic School days. It specifically reminded me of the biblical story of Jesus in Luke, where Jesus has his feet washed by the tears of a sinful woman and dried by her hair. At this point, Jonas Kaufmann was wearing a wig (I think) with short hair and everyone in the Knights of the Grail are decimated and wandering the pillaged and ravaged land. The pock marked stage and ethereal lighting again lend a lunar feel to the opera. As beams of light were projected onto the background stage wall Amfortas is cured by the spear Parsifal retrieved from Klingsor. “Oh. So that’s god,” the woman next to me whispered to her friend as the beams of light bathed the stage. Either that or a spaceship.
My only final question is about the end of the opera: does Kundry, who was cursed for laughing at Christ on the Cross, get set free at the end through Parsifal’s forgiveness of her? I think she does. But in any event, Parsifal, while at over 5 hours was definitely a long evening, left us feeling tired, but also dazed, altered and pondering what we just experienced. The production was amazing, the music transporting. There will have to be more Wagner in 2013-14 to repeat the experiment and gain firmer footing with the controversial composer.
– Elizabeth Frayer and Shawn E Milnes
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