Legs and Aesthetic Density: Lulu at the Metropolitan Opera

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Elizabeth – After seeing William Kentridge’s new production of Lulu on opening night at the Met, I realized I needed to see it a second time in order to fully take in the opera.  So we went again (thank you Met Rush lottery!) this past Saturday for one of the final performances.  This production has so much going on.

The opera opens with a carnival barker inviting you in as pen and ink drawings of animals are projected behind him; yet soon other inanimate objects like gas masks start appearing.  It’s disorienting, especially with the “12 tone” atonal music.  You’re never quite able to sit back and relax into the music of the opera, but I think that’s one of the points.  You’re supposed to be on edge and feel a bit off kilter and like you don’t know what will come next. 
After the prologue with the carnival barker we see Marlis Petersen, as Lulu, posing for the Painter.  She is wearing a white cylindrical paper mask and giant white paper hands that give her an unnerving look.  The Painter isn’t seeing her truly; or maybe she isn’t presenting herself to him.  This is the question I had throughout the opera: who is Lulu?  She appears to be whoever the men or woman, in the case of Countess Geschwitz, around her want her to be.  And her name changes too.  To one she was Nelly, another calls her Mignon.  But no one seems to really know her, if that is possible.  While the Painter is painting Lulu he seduces her, only to have her husband walk in and die of a heart attack upon discovering her infidelity.  Lulu’s only reaction is to reflect on how rich she now is.  It’s not clear if there is actually a person underneath the personas projected onto her.

Throughout the opera projections onto the back wall of the stage were constantly and quickly changing–from pen and ink drawings of women, clips from newspapers, a stage itself, even occasionally turning into Rorschach ink blots.  Later in Act 2, movies projected onto the wall told most of the plot.  The walls themselves were shifting panels that were mostly tan and had German Expressionistic art painted on them.  And that was just the background.  Onstage were lightly sketched rooms often with a piece or two of furniture that took up only small parts of the stage.  The rest of the stage was either blank or had action going on in the form of a silent woman who sometimes donned the same face mask as Lulu and alternately danced or sat at a piano and a male counterpart who assisted silently with props the singers needed. 
Marlis Petersen as Lulu is terrific.  She completely inhabited the character and was acting the entire time, a rarity in opera these days.  As many have mentioned, she has played the role of Lulu for 18 years and will be retiring it from her repertoire after this run at the Met.  I feel lucky to have seen her. 
Bass-baritone Johan Reuter was Dr. Schön, who took in Lulu as a young teenager and much later, despite his efforts to avoid it, ends up married to her.  He was powerful and commanding as her lover and savage later as her murderer, Jack the Ripper.  Franz Grundhaber is a creepy Schigolch, Lulu’s father or perhaps former lover, often tracking her town for money.  Daniel Brenna, brings a strong yet sweet voice to Schön’s son, Alwa, a naïve composer who also longs for Lulu.  And mezzo-soprano Susan Graham shines as Countess Geschwitz, a lesbian who has also fallen for Lulu, that Lulu uses to her advantage, of course.
This coming Thursday is the final performance of Lulu for the season.  If you can, go.  Trust me. 

Shawn – I enjoyed William Kentridge’s production of The Nose two years ago so immensely, I basically built our season this year around his new production of Lulu. We then ended up rushing tickets to see Lulu a second time.  I needed to in order to even begin to unravel the aesthetic density of it all.  Two highly dense and evocative artistic endeavors are occurring simultaneously onstage.  Berg’s opera itself and William Kentridge’s production of it.  This is not a bad thing.  This is what the Met should be doing, bringing in serious world class visual artists in an attempt to create challenging and thought provoking productions that linger far after the curtain has fallen.  Think Parsifal, the aforementioned The Nose, Anthony Minghella’s Madama Butterfly; these all have moments that stick with me vividly to this day.

One can’t expect this every night but how wonderful would it be to have two (or even one) a season?  Even if they don’t completely click, the aura of artistic disciplinary cross-pollination and intertextuality might resonate and affect future new production choices and even, perhaps, the institution as a whole.  Shoot for the stars, Met.  If not you, who? 

Marlis Petersen onstage is as attractive as any singer I have seen playing any role anywhere.  Ridiculously enough I completely missed the supertitles near the end of act one when Lulu is dictating to Schön the breakup letter to his fiancée because I was so pleasantly distracted by Petersen’s bare legs as she is perched in a chair and gesticulating with her foot.  Her legs as a symbol of Lulu’s sexual power over men are basically a character unto themselves.  So first time around I had no idea what the letter said.  I forced myself to read the titles the second time, though I could still feel Petersen’s pull drawing my eye back to her at all times.
In fact I watched extended sections of the show through our opera glasses, solely focused on Petersen.  Not only was she as magnetic and attractive as any performer I have seen onstage, her dramatic arc of character was as fully realized as any performance I have ever seen anywhere. 

In watching her so closely for sections it was almost as interesting to see what she did when not singing as when she was.  She is always listening, acting, reacting, alive and vital in the moment.  Is this really so hard?  I wish more singers would be this engaged in the dramatic action.  Petersen has said she is retiring the role after this production and I am so grateful I was able to see her in it.  Twice.
Additionally, in zooming in and out with our opera glasses from Petersen to the full stage action I found the character action easier to follow this time around.  I was a touch overwhelmed by Kentridge’s visuals at times in the first performance I saw.
This is not a criticism.  Great art should have many levels and invite multiple viewings. 
Sadly there is only one performance of Lulu left in the run.  If you haven’t seen it, go.  If you’ve already seen it, go again.  I pray they revive this production in the coming years.  I think there is much left in it to be discovered.


– Elizabeth Frayer & Shawn E Milnes


Related Links:

Wild Audiences, Roses and Spectacle: Il Trovatore and Turandot at the Metropolitan Opera

Runny Noses, Russian and Otherwise: The Nose at the Metropolitan Opera

A Womb in the Country: Ethel Smyth’s The Wrecker’s at Bard SummerScape

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