Opera: Faustian Scandal in Paris

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The most successful Parisian theater scandals need as much care and planning as the most successful general strikes. The opening-night audience must arrive at the Paris Opéra knowing just how furious it will soon become; how else would everyone be sure to bring rotten eggs and carrots under his coat? The Paris press seemed to be coaxing up a fine rumble shortly after the first rehearsal of Maurice Béjart's new production of Berlioz' The Damnation of Faust. HOW BÉJART WILL UNDRESS MARGUERITE, promised one headline; FAUST IS A PEEPING TOM, declared another. It was no surprise that Paris greeted one of the freshest and most imaginative productions that the Opéra has had in years with the most furious scandal since Wagner brought Tannhäuser to town in 1861.

Perverse Roses. From the first lurid hint that Béjart's Faust was a little special, everyone hoped for the worst. Béjart, 37, has a well-burnished reputation as an enfant terrible director of theater, ballet and opera. His talent for welding all three together into erotic iconoclastic visions of such works as The Merry Widow and The Tales of Hoffmann has made his name a café cliché: "style Béjart" means art that is mercilessly frank.

But what Béjart did to Faust was something else again. Suppressing his chronic urge to spoon a little musique concrète into the score (out of veneration for Berlioz), Béjart saved himself for the "illustrations"—-as he calls his scenes and dance sequences. Gargoyles dance a twist to parody the Last Supper, and the "sons of the Danube" show up in SS uniforms. The corps de ballet wear costumes that come close to perfection in their imitation of nudity, and their dances have an angular brutality. Faust appears as the prisoner of a giant glob of seaweed, suspended above the stage in a play of lights that have the harsh glare of misery. Mephistopheles is a sexual chameleon—a lover of "perverse roses," a force of violent poetry.

Social Drama. Under the sweep of Béjart's bizarre and dark imagination, the sum of such tricks was a triumph. A dusty and innocuous opera became a modern social drama—and such events are just what the Paris Opéra needs to improve on its present status as the place across the street from American Express. But Béjart was booed as well as cheered by his audience, and the papers barely let him get out of town before they began their battle: "Paroxysms of vulgarity," "A universe of fantasy and poetry." SHOULD BÉJART BE BURNED? said one headline. Back home in Brussels, Béjart announced that he would put opera aside for the time being and concentrate on ballet.