Punch and Judy shows are...well, they're not something I've thought super-much about, but they, and puppetry in general, seem to occupy a historical niche that's very hard to categorize nowadays. I know they still exist, but they can't help feeling like a throwback. Do they have any relevance here and now? I am not sure. But I want to see one. You don't really get much of an opportunity these days, at least not in the US. I guess you do if you go to a British beach. There's also a Commodore 64 game, which is apparently not bad.
Well. Anyway. You hear about Birtwistle sometimes--that's Sir Harrison Birtwistle to you--and there's a production (a prize-winning production, apparently) of this, his first opera, on youtube. So I decided to have a look in.
It's not exactly a Punch and Judy show. It's a...is "deconstruction" the right word? Something like that. Punch is generally amoral, is my understanding, but here he's just psychotic: right at the beginning, he kills both Judy and the baby (although all killed characters reappear in different guises) and then goes off in search of his love, Pretty Polly, which results in a sort of ritualistic, repetitive series of journeys. The subtitle situation was not ideal; it's often very hard to make out the words, and the fact that the subtitles are in French, and don't always correspond to with the spoken text often make them more a distraction than anything.
I think this plot conceit is interesting...in theory. It sort of made me feel like I was reading Deleuze and Guattari again. It should be the kind of thing that's right up my alley. And yet: GOOD GOD was this ever excruciating to watch. I absolutely hated every second of it. From the horrendously irritating, screechy music to the stylized, yelping singing to the way the characters mugged (which I'm sure is true to the spirit of the thing)--seriously, fuck this opera. I still feel a kind of reluctance to call something like this "bad," thinking oh, maybe I just don't understand it--and I don't know. Maybe not. But I feel comfortable in saying that I have never had a worse operatic experience. Supposedly at the premiere, Benjamin Britten left at the intermission. I am dumber than him, unfortunately.
And yet, the way my brain works, I can't help thinking, I must be missing something. In a perverse way, I want to see more Birtwistle to see if I can make sense of his idiom. But fuck me, man. This was not an auspicious introduction. If I ever see an opera I like less, I won't write about it here because it will have literally killed me.
Well, Puppet shows still are in US... They are called "Sesame street" and "Muppets" ;) So I'm sure there is room for live prefromance as well.
ReplyDeleteIn Warsaw we have an literal theater that specialises in puppets shows but as far I know it's more puppets + humans shows, not sure how much of them go just "full puppets". I think it's a bit like clowns. It may feel like anachronistic but it's such a part of pop-culture it's not something that will fully vanish even if it won't be a thing you use to seeing.
As for Punch and Judgy - man talk about things that age bad, the oryginal shows are are about child abuse and domestic violance toward a woman. I guess it's possible to still make new shows with these characters but removing the troublesome elements and even uptading the themes - hell, I can very well imagine an super-liberal version of these plays... it's just has pretty problmeatic hisotry.