Until reading another thread on the POB forum, I did not know that Paris had a full-evening ballet, by Roland Petit, based on Proust's A la recherche du temps perdu (translated as "In Search of Lost Time" in the latest series of translations available from Penguin). Even better, they are, according to Azulynn, filming it this spring.

Sophia kindly included a link to the POB website, with a long summary of the ballet.

The first 7 scenes are gathered under the title: "Proustian images of paradise." The final 6, under the title "Proustian images of hell." The accompanying description suggests that the choreography -- like Tudor's Lilac Garden -- deals with recognizable situations rather than complicated elaborations of plot. However, there is the implication that knowledge of quite specific plot details might in fact be necessary to understanding and appreciating what Petit has in mind. Certainly, the average viewer would need some idea of who Swann, Odette (not the swan; Petipa fans might get confused here), St. Loup, Albertine, Morel, Charlus, and the duchesse de Guermantes might be.

This got me thinking about how you deal with such a vast work -- and SO MUCH PLOT -- in a non-verbal mediuim like dance. Do we get a characterization of EACH of the members of Mme. Verdurin's "little clan" during Scene I? How can the the aging duchesse de Guermantes in the last scene have the significance she seems intended to have if we don't have young Marcel's obsession with her much earlier on? How can you leave out the duc de Guermantes, one of the great haracters in French literature? How do you portray Mme. Verdurin's subsequent marriage (a surprise in the last volume, and one which occurs decades after we first meet this character) to the Prince de Guermantes?

Has anyone seen this ballet -- either as a whole or one or more of its parts? What did you think? Do you know anything more about plans for a video release?

I think Tableau VII is the one I mentioned in the Potential Storylines for Ballets some months back. It's on the video 'Natasha' with Makarova and Denys Ganio. I looked back quickly and saw that I'd thought it was part of a larger work, but I've done no further research. I believe Mel had mentioned it earlier in the thread.

According to the POB website, Proust ou les Intermittences du Coeur should be recorded on 12th, 15th and 19th March and broadcasted on french television (France2 - date unknown) before DVD release. We don't know the chosen cast yet.

Here's the casting:Link to POB website

Detailed casting for Proust has finally been posted on the Paris Opera web site. If it holds, the filmed version will feature:

Albertine: Eleonora Abbagnato
Andrée: Caroline Bance
Young Proust: Hervé Moreau
Morel: Benjamin Pech
Saint-Loup: Mathieu Ganio
Charlus: Manuel Legris
Odette: Eve Grinsztajn
Swann: Alexis Renaud
The Duchess: Stéphanie Romberg
pas de deux: Laura Hecquet - Christophe Duquenne
Gilberte: Mathilde Froustey
Topless: Peggy Dursort

So, Benjamin Pech will drop his pants, while Peggy Dursort goes topless. Naturally, there will be lots of simulated sex to go around.

For those interested, here are a couple of New York Times reviews from the 1983 run of Proust at the Met.

French Company Opens in Petit's 'Proust' (with Mathieu Ganio's parents as Albertine and Proust)
Natalia Makarova in 'Proust' (with Richard Cragun in the title role)

According to revised casting, Stéphane Bullion will replace Benjamin Pech as Morel in the performances scheduled to be filmed.

Poor Pech can't seem to stay injury-free for long. He survived Coppélia only to be injured during Giselle, and recovered in time for Agon and a gala in New York, only to be knocked out of Proust.

France 2 evening news included a brief segment on Proust today, March 9. Skip ahead to the second last report in broadcast ("Le pari ambitieux de Roland Petit"). It includes comments from Eleonora Abbagnato and Petit in between perfomance footage.

http://jt.france2.fr/20h

The report will be available under Les éditions précédents for the next week.

Since I will not have the opportunity to see this run live, I'm glad that the ballet is being recorded, though I can't help wishing that the film would feature Isabelle Ciaravola as Albertine. I know that Petit has admired Abbagnato since her student days, but Ciaravola has those long, stretchy legs which remind me of Petit muses such as Dominique Khalfouni and Lucia Lacarra, and which I'm sure would serve the Prisonnière pas de deux beautifully.

This, from Anna Kisselgoff's 1983 review, sounds hopeful:By the way, a belated thanks to volcanohunter for posting those two links to earlier performances.

Well, let's not forget that Kisselgoff has more tolerance for certain expressionist choreographers than other critics - she vigorously defended Eifman's work.

Croce also wrote on the Proust ballet - she loathed it. So triangulate from there - if you tend to agree more with Croce; I would approach the Petit with caution.

For what it's worth, Clement Crisp in the Financial Times wrote that the production is worth crossing the Channel for ("A memorable event. Vaut le voyage."), and Pia Catton in the New York Sun wrote, "Seeing his work in this theater, with these dancers, made me wonder why we don't get more of his work in America...But the reality is that the Petit sensibility is so direct and sometimes so piercing that it can make Americans squirm." Somehow I doubt that Joel Lobenthal would have been so complimentary. So yeah, it would depend on how you react to expressionistic choreography.

This particular set of statements, which does not address the choreography directly, seems non-objectionable. I'd be very interesting to see how Petit integrates Proust's own musical references into the larger theater piece. One of the small frustrations with Proust is that, although certain music -- especially Gabriel Faure's -- figure prominently in the Narrator's memory, the reader can't actually hear them while reading.