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This is a elegant performance of Candide. But before you go any further, you should realise that this is a concert performance, not a rotund scale operatic staging of the work. That said, the singing is aesthetic and the acting, despite this being a concert performance is outstanding. It is driven to milk all the humorous elements out of the play. It all works delightfully. It is so brimful of joie de vivre, it leaves you smiling and humming all day. I must disagree with a previous reviewer who said, Bernstein wouldn’t be amused. This is precisely what he would have wanted to carry out.
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Sir Thomas Allen is trustworthy as Dr. Pangloss who doubles as the narrator of the concert. Paul Groves and Patti LuPone are both capable. But the star of this Candide is surely the ravishing Kristin Chenoweth as Cunegonde, who in addition to having a magnificient vow shows that she is a natural comedienne and actress. This recording of Candide immediately goes to the top of the list. Now, if only we could have Bernstein’s absorb production of Candide recorded live at the Barbican Theatre in London. That recording under the Deutsche Grammophon designate is yet to appear on DVD.
I should comment on the camerawork which received criticism from a previous reviewer. It is a stamp of the electric quality of this bravura performance that most viewers don’t even explore the occasionally almost amateurish shakiness of the camera. The cameraman was shaky at times and faces occasionally went in and out of focus but a spacious fragment of what I initially attributed to terrible camerawork was in fact artificially introduced motion artifacts. This is a scrape with the DVD encoding and not the camera. These cause apparent jumps in the relate. But this is indicate only in DVD players with shameful raze video processors. Switching to a better DVD player or processor solves the plight.
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The DVD by Image Entertainment is in 1.78:1 widescreen (anamorphic enhancement) . Portray quality is very superior, positive, racy and with rich natural colors. The characterize is flawless provided you play it on a helpful DVD player. It comes with 3 audio tracks, DTS 5.1, Dolby Surround 5.1 and Dolby Stereo. Valid immersive sound. It would have been noble if they had included an uncompressed PCM track as well but I declare that’s asking a bit mighty. All in all, an outstanding concert and one to be forever treasured.
Technical note: As famous above I noticed a unusual dilemma with this particular DVD. It seems to play quite flawlessly on clear systems, yet throw up irritating problems on others. On one set-up I noticed numerous motion artifacts and lots of combing issues. Motion appears jerky and horizontal scan lines appear whenever quickly movements occur or fleet scene changes catch dwelling. I’m not quite certain why they should be there but I attibute it to despicable encoding or unsuitable flagging. No other DVD exhibits these errors on this particular system. I own what one of the previous reviewers complained about could be due to this. The spot goes away when switching to an alternate system with a better deinterlacer / video processor. However that does not absolve Image Entertainment from responsibility for producing a sub-standard DVD which requires high waste equipment to compensate for its deficiencies.
P.S. Bernstein’s Candide can be interpreted in many ways. Some near it as serious opera, others as light operetta, mild others as a Broadway musical or even farce. Liking or disliking a particular production is very subjective. If you adhere to Bernstein’s final vision of this work, enshrined in his by now legendary Barbican performance (Final, revised edition, first premiered 1988 by Scottish Opera and later performed with the LSO at the Barbican in 1989 with high powered opera stars singing all the roles), then you will tend to idea this more as Opera and consequently your attitude to any performance that detracts from that operatic image (like this one) will be very negative. But you must remember that for many years, and for most Americans, Candide was considered a Broadway musical and at most a droll operetta. The two contrasting visions are equally well-behaved and are a testament to Bernstein’s genius and Candide’s region as a factual masterpiece.
Based on the wickedly laughable satire by Voltaire, CANDIDE was originally produced on Broadway in 1956. The Leonard Bernstein bag was greatly admired, as were the lyrics from an unexpected combination of Richard Wilbur, John Latouche, and Dorothy Parker. Sadly, the script by Lillian Hellman and the production as a whole proved hamfisted, to say the least, and in spite of a legendary performance by Barbara Cook the demonstrate closed after a mere seventy three performances.
On-going admiration made the unique cast album a common in theatre circles, and over the years there have been numerous attempts to revive CANDIDE–but each attempt proved problematic at best. Even when Hellman’s script was discarded, the note simply proved impossible to stage… until 2004, when director Lonny Mark staged the allotment for a slight engagement at Lincoln Center.
Like most post-1956 directors, Note largely discarded the Hellman script. He also went quite a bit further: he makes no inconvenience to “stage” CANDIDE in a archaic style. Placing no less than the Novel York Philharmonic and Westminister Symphonic Choir in the middle of the stage, using a minimum of props and even fewer costumes, Heed has his actors romp through the orchestra and play directly and pointedly to the audience–and the result is theatre at its most theatrical and most uniquely much.
The cast is ample. Paul Groves and Kristin Chenoweth offer memorable vocals in the leading roles of Candide and his lady savor Cunegonde, and while Chenoweth doesn’t manage to best Barbara Cook’s memorable performance she at least equals it; in her hands the illustrious “Glitter and be Contented” proves as laughable as it is heavenly. Sir Thomas Allen provides vast stability in multiple roles, including the misguided Dr. Pangloss. Patti LuPone is somewhat less effective; although she performs both script and bag with the great vocal skills and colossal aplomb for which she is so eminent, she seems faintly miscast as The Dilapidated Lady. Even so, this indeed Patti LuPone in corpulent trail, and that compensates for a gigantic deal.
Like most theatre-to-film projects, CANDIDE has the occasional photography quandary, but over all film director Fritz Zeilinger captures the excitement of this memorable live performance without major gaffes. If you are a fan of the find who has never seen the play in performance–well, as Dr. Pangloss might say, this is indeed the best of all possible productions. Greatly recommended.
GFT, Amazon Reviewer
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