![\"Dialogues](\"http:\/\/www.musicalamerica.com\/mablogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/08\/dialoguesBelAir.jpg\")
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By ANDREW POWELL MUNICH \u2014 BelAir Classiques<\/a> and Mezzo TV<\/a> have succeeded in getting a ban overturned on their sale and airing, respectively, of a 2010 filmed staging of Dialogues des Carm\u00e9lites<\/em> made here at Bavarian State Opera<\/a>.<\/p>\n The ban, or arr\u00eat<\/em>, had been imposed in 2015 by the Cour d\u2019appel<\/em> in Paris following a complaint by heirs of Francis Poulenc and the opera\u2019s source novelist Georges Bernanos<\/a>.<\/p>\n In that court\u2019s judgment, \u201cthe staging by Dmitri Tcherniakov<\/a> realizes in its final scene a d\u00e9naturation<\/em> of the [opera] and thus infringes the moral rights of authors attached to it.\u201d D\u00e9naturation<\/em> translates as adulteration or falsification.<\/p>\n Indeed the Russian director substitutes in the climactic scene a deadly gas blast and one self-sacrifice for the serial guillotining of the titular nuns laid out graphically in Poulenc\u2019s music.<\/p>\n But France\u2019s higher Cour de cassation<\/em> saw the case differently in its June 27 ruling, according to BelAir and Mezzo attorney Judith Adam-Caumeil of Cabinet Adam-Caumeil<\/a>, a law firm specialized in Franco-German business.<\/p>\n It overturned the ban, she said, because no alteration had been made to libretto or score and the Cour d\u2019appel<\/em> had admitted that the opera\u2019s essential themes, such as hope, martyrdom, grace, and the communion of saints, dear to Bernanos and Poulenc, had been respected.<\/p>\n Declaring the case a \u201clandmark\u201d with regard to \u201cartistic freedom of staging in French law,\u201d she suggested the ruling would apply equally to \u201ctheater, ballet or cinema.\u201d<\/p>\n Not at issue was copyright, even with Dialogues<\/em> remaining rights-protected in Europe and America, although this status kept BStO and its director from tampering with the words and music.<\/p>\n Adam-Caumeil: \u201cTcherniakov certainly brought his own vision to the original work by altering the final scene, but the music and text remained unchanged. The essential themes \u2026 were respected because the nuns were ready to die \u2026 . Thus, no d\u00e9naturation<\/em> of the primary work can be blamed on Tcherniakov.\u201d<\/p>\n BStO joined in appealing the ban. Dialogues<\/em> most recently appeared on the company\u2019s National Theater stage early last year, in defiance of a letter from the heirs<\/a> (but not of the ban), and will in 2020 return, said BelAir distributor Naxos<\/a> in an Aug. 4 statement.<\/p>\n BelAir and Mezzo can now profit from the content as before, and Naxos early this month relaunched BelAir\u2019s DVD along with a new Blu-ray<\/a> edition.<\/p>\n Illustration \u00a9 BelAir Classiques<\/p>\n Related posts:
Published: August 18, 2017<\/span><\/p>\n
\nPoulenc Heirs v. Staatsoper<\/a>
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\nReturn of the Troubadour<\/a>
\nKu\u0161ej Saps Verdi\u2019s Forza<\/a><\/p>\n