Carlos’s Carmen mashup revisits Sadler’s Wells retaining the essential themes of desire and betrayal, as well as the devastating consequences of lust.
A blood moon. Dim, eerie light.
An evil bull with his extraordinarily obvious horn.
A woman and a man, manipulated by the bull, dancing in a machinic way.
This is our first encounter with Carlos’s brand new, now two-act adaptation of Carmen, which he developed from his one-act production in 2015, based on Bizet’s opera score. Infusing a variety of noticeable elements including flamenco, contemporary dance, and ensemble movement, this semi-deconstructed Carmen retains the novella’s essential themes of desire and betrayal, as well as the devastating consequences of lust.
What’s most salient in this production is its effortless handling in-between symbolism and phenomenological embodiment. One of the most significant symbols is the bull, played by Carlos Acosta himself, whose horns denote human desire and its evil nature. By dancing with Carmen (Laura Rodríguez) and Don José (Alejandro Silva) in a manipulative manner, Carlos not only displays exceptional masculinity but also wittily indicates his dual role as choreographer—both orchestrating the show and the fates of Carmen and Don José. At the age of 51, his duet with Rodríguez is remarkable.
There are other symbolic elements, such as the massive red moon signalling Carmen’s bloody fate, designed by Tim Hatley, who also created the jail cell for the first encounter between Carmen and Don José. The duet dances in and outside the cell connected by a rope, and eventually, Don José is entrapped by Carmen, with rope fully around his body. This bewitchment might be a bit cliché, but it metaphorically reveals their situation as being encaged by their own desires.
While these symbolic elements express the show’s thematic interpretation, the dancers’ fluid body movements embody their emotions: passion, jealousy, fury, repentance, and regret. Even though the ensemble occasionally removes their clothes, it feels sexy but not sexualised. There is also a slight contrast between the sex scenes with Don José and with Escamillo (Enrique Corrales). While the first is sweet and soft, distilled with innocent love, joy, and happiness, the latter feels more rampant and feral, hinting at a probing competition for control.
The ensemble of Acosta Danza is no less impressive than the soloists. Together with Rodión Shchedrin’s arrangement, their movements express an aesthetic that feels crystallised and smooth while mixing ballet, flamenco, and Cuban-style dance. The scene of a table dance at the beginning of ACT II, as well as a group finger-snapping mimicking the melody without backtrack showcasing great synchrony, are especially memorable.
The reason why it is a semi-deconstruction rather than a full deconstruction is that the narrative per se is still told in a linear order without really being mashed up, and the character portrayals are too simplified and stereotypical. Carmen appears exceedingly arrogant, merely following her true desire with little internal complexity. Don José becomes a cuckolded and timid coward while Escamillo’s handsomeness and masculinity leave an impression of a manga-like character.
With Peter Mumford’s symbolic lighting and Hatley’s minimalist design, maybe I’m becoming greedy, expecting something more: either a thorough deconstruction of the linear narrative, or a bolder inquiry into the themes of lust and desire.