CARMEN

Free or trapped?

CARMEN is one of opera’s most complex heroines to understand. How can she declare at the beginning that she is “free as a bird”, only to end up believing it is her fate to seek out the man she knows will kill her?

Ultimately, Georges Bizet’s hit opera from 1875 is about a fundamental truth: a man’s greatest fear is being made a fool of, while a woman’s is being killed. One in five homicides in Denmark is committed by a current or former partner. CARMEN thus becomes a symbol of all the women killed by their partners – the stories we hear all too often in the news, leaving us bewildered and horrified, wondering: How could this happen?

CARMEN is sung in Danish with Danish surtitles.

Performers:

The Danish National Opera Chorus, South Jutland Symphony Orchestra

Producer: The Danish National Opera
Composer: Georges Bizet
Conductor: Maria Itkonen
Director: Johanne Holten
Set and Costume Designer: Gøje Rostrup
Lighting Designer: Michael Breiner
Photography: The Danish National Opera

Running time: Approx. 2 hours 15 minutes, including an interval