Can You Hear The People Sing Again?

Sun Herald

Sunday October 28, 2007

Angelique Chrisafis

Once immune to the allure of hit musicals, the French capital has embraced England's 'toe-tapping' tastes, writes Angelique Chrisafis.

Go to London for the musicals and Paris for the food, the old saying used to go. While the French capital once excelled at dining, museums and new-wave cinema, it didn't care for singalong shows.

Now the Paris theatre scene is braced for a revolution as big entertainment groups import Broadway and London West End hits. France, which has long defended its cultural identity from identikit global tastes, seems about to embrace the Anglo-Saxon toe-tapping style.

Earlier this month, The Lion King, seen by 30 million people worldwide, opened in Paris, translated into French. The infrastructure was so unprepared that the Stage Entertainment company had to buy a theatre with a listed facade and rebuild its interior to what it called "London standards". It is now the only private theatre space in Paris with seats for today's taller and larger frames, where your knees don't touch the seat in front. Le Roi Lion plans an indefinite run, once unheard of in France.

Last year, the same company brought Sam Mendes's hit Cabaret to the Folies Bergere music hall, where it was performed in French with a local cast. The company was told it was a huge risk but Cabaret has now extended its run and played to 200,000 people since last October. Mendes was so impressed, he is considering reviving it on Broadway.

An article in Nouvel Observateur magazine wondered if France would "succumb to the Broadway-isation of the world".

"A mysterious cultural exception, our nation of old-fashioned operettas has always been a Bermuda triangle for musicals," it said.

After the hit-and-miss operettas of 50 years ago, Parisian musicals fell into decline until the late 1990s show Notre Dame De Paris. This season also boasts much-hyped runs of Abba Gold, Elvis The Musical and West Side Story. Arnaud Cazet of Stage Entertainment hopes musicals will become a fixture on the Paris entertainment scene.

"In Paris, you can see 400 shows a night ranging from stand-up comedy to stadium rock concerts or the Moulin Rouge, but long-running musicals don't exist. We hope to change that."

© 2007 Sun Herald

Back to News Index | Back to Home