The new production of The Makropoulos case is a complete success. What music! What a show!
Olivier Bellamy, Le Point
A new production brilliant in its clarity
Erwan Gentric, Bachtrack
The direction of the actors is spot on, perfectly supporting a highly readable production, perhaps not the most innovative, but remarkably coherent in any case, and highly faithful to the piece. A wonderful moment of theatre.
Didier Van Moere, Diapason
A complex quarrel over heritage that the director, who is also director of the Opéra de Lyon, makes clear thanks to a judicious use of lamé curtains, models and stage sets.
Vincent Borel, Classica
This is a production of exemplary fidelity to the work and remarkable plastic beauty.
Olivier Bellamy, le Point
A real detective story with an exciting narrative, The Makropoulos Case is also a challenge for the orchestra and the voices. Richard Bunel’s staging makes it easy to follow, and Ausrine Stundyte plays a fascinating Emilia Marty. A great success.
Hélène Adam, cult.news
The other key idea is to show the heroine’s restlessness through the astonishing vitality of the scenic elements on stage, as well as the characters, while the multiplicity of simultaneous scene plays reveals many unspoken textual elements.
Florent Coudeyrat, Concerto Net
Richard Brunel is to be congratulated for using these starting points to create a show that captivates the audience without the slightest lull, that respects the action while introducing a welcome note of dreaminess when Emilia Marty briefly succumbs to her demons, embodied by a quintet of chenus-like extras, joined by Hauk-Šendorf, who appears here as a ghost rather than a character existing in the same dimension as the others.
Laurent Bury, Concert Classic
An ingenious two-level set by Bruno de Lavenère (who also designed the costumes), allowing the previous scene to be extended or the next to be anticipated on the upper floor while the action progresses on the lower floor. Furniture from the 1920s that moves from the garden to the courtyard and back again. Very strict costumes and beautiful bright white dresses for Emilia. Richard Brunel’s direction is effective, to the point and consistent with his reading of the play.
Pierre Tricou, ODB-Opéra
The production is luminous in its scenic clarity; everything becomes crystal clear in Richard Brunel’s staging: the negotiations and legal wrangling that abound throughout the action; the relief of the opposing personalities, mixed together, confronted: the innocence of young souls in love, for example Krista and her dreams of the stage and the theatre, and her love for her fiancé Janek; both of which go awry in this biting, cynical theatre.
Emmanuel Andrieu, Classique news
Richard Brunel and Alexander Joel get it right in Makropoulos Case
Vincent Borel, Classica
This final production in Lyon’s rich season has many seductive assets, confirming the Opéra de Lyon’s central place in the French operatic world.
Hélène Adam, cult.news
A successful new staging by Richard Brunel (director of the institution since 2021): this is the main highlight of the evening, as his work explores the intricacies of a libretto that is complex to unravel at the beginning of the work, with a welcome desire to educate.
Florent Coudeyrat, Concerto Net
Makropoulos Case
Leoš Janáček
Libretto from the composer based on homonym play by Karel Capek
Opera in 3 acts – 1926
Music direction Alexander Joel
Stage direction Richard Brunel
Set design and Costumes Bruno de Lavenère
Collaboration to the costumes Claudine Crauland
Lighting design Laurent Castaingt
Dramaturgy Catherine Ailloud-Nicolas
Chorus Master Benedict Kearns
Stage assistant Ester Pieri
Music assistant David Svec
Cast
Ausrine Stundyte
Denys Pivnitskyi
Paul Curievici
Thandiswa Mpongwana
Károly Szemerédy
Tómas Tómasson
Robert Lewis
Marcel Beekman
Paolo Stupenengo
Gerhardt Comblet
Gérard Desmoulins
Patrick Malod
Jean-Claude Mossière
Jacques Pallas
Lyon Opera Orchestra and Chorus
Produced by Opera National de Lyon