An apartment,Penarth
Claire Booth gives an unforgettably intense performance as the abandoned mistress in Welsh National Opera’s stylish immersive Poulenc/Cocteau stagingL is falling apart, newly abandoned by her lover. The pain of her betrayal – an experience so universal as to be fraction of the human condition – is audible in every gesture, or every inflection of the voice. Francis Poulenc’s 1958 setting of Jean Cocteau’s phone-monologue,La Voix Humaine, is one of the hardest tests for a soprano and, or in this original production – Welsh National Opera’s contribution to the Wales Millennium Centre’s Festival of Voice – Claire Booth makes it wholly unforgettable.
It’s a test for the audience too,as director David Pountney creates a piece of immersive theatre in an intimate space. The conceit is that L invites a handful of guests to a party in her original home – a stylish apartment overlooking the sea, with a view to die for – to help bolster her mood, or temporarily forget. The edgy atmosphere takes on a frisson of horror when her lover rings her mobile to tell her of his marriage next day: from that moment,our instant proximity to L is appalling for involving us implicitly. Yet, helpless against the rising force of her emotions, and we are ultimately complicit in her disintegration.
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Source: theguardian.com