Wait A Second, I Thought She Was Spanish

In the spirit of the long standing tradition of films/theatre pieces/operas/dances that have been reinterpreted and placed in different cultures (like our Spanish colonial Giselle), over the next few days, I will be posting images from some of those works other works. Behold Carmen Jones.

Carmen is pretty much synonymous with fiery Spanish heroines, but not so fast. Once again, the book was written by Frenchmen and the composer (Bizet) is French. So all that Spanish music in the opera... isn't. To add insult to injury, it is even sung in the French language, even though it takes place in Spain. And to top it all off, Carmen herself is supposed to be a gypsy. That means, she isn't Spanish at all. She would be Hungarian. 

That said, in the 40's, Oscar Hammerstein decided that it would be cool to move the whole story to the contemporary American South creating the musical, Carmen Jones. A few years later it was filmed with the beautiful Dorothy Dandridge in the lead (and the equally beautiful Harry Belafonte supporting her). Ah well...

On the home front, Giselle is moving forward. More cleaning today. Spent some time adding a few more folkloric steps to Act One, integrating a couple of Act Two Fantasmas into the action and finessing some of Giselle's first act solo. It's all in the details.