Nice Opera opens the 2024-25 season with a comic-opera by Charles Lecoq – La fille de Madame Angot (The Daughter of Madame Angot). This fun and joyful production is staged by Richard Brunel and directed by Lise Labro, with Chloé Dufresne leading the Nice Philharmonic Orchestra and the Nice Opera Chorus.
Charles Lecoq, who lived between 1832 and 1918, was one of the principal French composers of operettas, who were regarded as the heirs to Offenbach. Lecoq’s first work, Le Docteur Miracle, was written in 1857 for a competition organised by Offenbach, following which he wrote eleven operettas, as well as polkas, mazurkas, schottisches and five volumes of songs. Considered as one of the greatest geniuses of comic opera, he kept alive the spirit of Offenbach in the French operetta, adapting it to the more sober style of light opera prevalent after the Franco-Prussian war.
La fille de Madame Angot – for which he was particularly known – was written in 1872 in the city of Brussels where he had settled. A comic opera in three acts, it has a libretto by Clairville, Paul Siraudin and Victor Koning, and fictional characters cross paths with historical ones in a plot that is as funny as it is thrilling. The world premiere was held at the Fantaisies-Parisiennes in Brussels on 4th December, 1872.
The piece was originally set during the 5-year period of French history known as the Directoire (Directory), where the rulers were known to be very corrupt, but after the Franco-Prussian War was lost for France, the country wanted to escape to a more colourful past. Richard Brunel has, however, brought the action forward to the “revolution” of May of 1968, and set it inside a car factory. He and conductor Chloé Dufresne use this production to portray a combative youth in search of truth and freedom.
The story of La fille de Madame Angot tells of Clairette, daughter of the fictional character Madame Angot – a fishmonger and spokeswoman for Parisians during the Revolution. Clairette was raised by market-hall merchants after her mother’s death, and obviously inherited her mother’s feisty spirit and fiery temperament, since the merchants want her to marry the lovable Pomponnet, a wigmaker, but she has set her sights on Ange Pitou, a cabaret entertainer, who is wanted by the Directorate’s police.
With an all-French cast, this production features Hélène Guilmette as Clairette Angot, Valentine Lemercier as Mademoiselle Lange, Enguerrand de Hys as Pomponnet and Philippe-Nicolas Martin as Ange Pitou. Also in the cast are Matthieu Lécroart, Hersilie Floriane Derthe, Antoine Foulon, Geoffrey Carey and Matthieu Walendzik.
This new staging of La fille de Madame Angot – a coproduction of the Opéra-Comique, Palazzetto Bru Zane, Opéra Nice Côte d’Azur, Opéra de Lyon and Opéra Grand Avignon – is presented in French, with surtitles in French and English. It takes place on 28th and 29th September at Opéra Nice Côte d’Azur.
The presentation on 29th September is at 3.00 pm, and 5 to 10 year olds can learn about opera for just €5, whilst parents are watching the show. Reservations for this project can be made at the box office, subject to availability. Reservations for La fille de Madame Angot can be made either at the box office (Tel 04 92 17 40 40) or online at the Nice Opera website.
Information sourced from:
Nice Cote d’Azur Opera programme notes
This article first appeared in Riviera Buzz
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