Product: La Traviata (2001)
Rating: 5.0
A Classic Traviata/To Die For
This 1992 La Traviata depicts a truly classic era of performances of this heart-rending opera so beloved by millions. It's filmed in the Gran Teatro La Fenice, Venice, where La Traviata was premiered on March 6, 1853. (This original opera house was destroyed by fire in 1996 and rebuilt.)In this performance, Edita Gruberova is every inch...La Dame aux camelias...the Grande Dame of the Camellias. Her voice is impeccable and her portrayal of Violetta is that of a passive heroine submitting ladylike to her fate. Just when she has regained her reason to live in the arms of her beloved Alfredo, her life is snuffed out like a candle.No stranger to chronic illness myself, I prefer a more vibrant portrayal of Violetta Valery more like that of Anna Netrebko in the 2005 Salzburg Festival production on DVD. This Violetta lives unstoppably each day and defies fate to strike her down right up to her very last moments.I've always believed that Neil Shicoff was vocally destined for the role of Alfredo Germont. I've seen him portray Alfredo live with more more fire than he shows here. I was struck by how Hoffmann-like this Alfredo is, as though, Shicoff is combining La Traviata with Les Contes d'Hoffmann, in an Alfredo inebriated now just with love but love for yet another woman soon to be lost to him.In a newspaper interview with Neil Shicoff which was published in 1986, I wrote that Neil Shicoff "has an innate sense of drama and a voice that angels might envy." This is very evident here.La Traviata is very dear to my heart as Giuseppe Verdi's finest opera.