When our Programming team here at the Edinburgh International Festival first saw the Opéra-Comique’s new production of Carmen in Paris, they were struck by the symbolic power of the stage design.

The stage bolsters director Andreas Homoki’s vision to trace how Carmen became one of the most performed operas in the world, starting with its controversial premiere 149 years ago, which startled audiences with its themes of violence and seduction. Before Carmen arrives in Edinburgh from 4–8 August, we invited opera expert Lucy Walker to interview Paul Zoller, the creator behind the stage.

Carmen’s breakthrough into popular culture  

Carmen has been source material for more than 80 films, including Carmen Jones (1954) and Carmen: A Hip-Hopera (2001) starring Beyoncé. Operabase records over 17,000 staged performances of Carmen since 1978 (third in popularity only to The Marriage of Figaro and La Traviata).     

Aspects of Carmen are elsewhere embedded within popular contemporary culture, from cameos on Disney soundtracks, to the backdrop of insurance commercials. In this context, one of the challenges facing Homoki and Stage Designer Zoller was to find a way of presenting Carmen that did not, as Zoller put it, ‘misuse’ the work by simply relying on its popularity. Speaking from his Berlin studio, Zoller shared his vision for the set: to probe the ways in which Carmen has been interpreted on stage throughout its 149-year history.  

Timeless symbolism

Zoller’s starting point was the 1875 premiere at the Opéra-Comique in Paris. He reproduced the distinctive back wall from the opera house, which is an integral part of the scenery throughout the new production. The ritual of going to the opera itself is folded into the staging: the bourgeois audience from 1875 appears on stage in Act I as the chorus. A specific curtain, based on the stage curtain at the nearby Palais Garnier (which opened the same year as Carmen’s premiere), makes occasional appearances, swishing back and forth, behind and in front of the stage characters. 

Audiences across the centuries

Both the reproduced wall and the curtain symbolise the initial response of the Opéra-Comique regulars in 1875. It appeared to shock – violate, even – the audience, who were accustomed to happy endings rather than brutal murder. Critics and audiences alike railed against the ‘low-life’ characters, and the supposed ‘vulgarity’ of Carmen herself. For Zoller, the original audience's appearance allows contemporary viewers to imagine what their historical counterparts would have observed, and felt, back in 1875.  

Time-travelling staging

Zoller’s background in architecture sowed the seeds for his interest in what he terms ‘time-travelling’. When he moved from architecture to stage design, he became fascinated by its temporal nature compared with formal architecture which, reasonably enough, requires its buildings to stay up as long as possible. In this production of Carmen, the staging and costumes travel across the 1940s, the 1970s, and finally arrive in the 2020s. Through Zoller’s innovative staging, the enduring history of the opera, and accumulating cultural impact, becomes part of the dramatic experience. 

Get your tickets for Carmen at the Festival Theatre from 4–8 Aug.

Written by Dr Lucy Walker

Dr Lucy Walker is a writer, researcher and speaker on classical music. Alongside editorial and exhibition credits, Walker has contributed chapters to several volumes. These include Literary Britten: Words and Music in Benjamin Britten’s Vocal Works (2019) and Lives of Houses (2020), in which she writes alongside Simon Armitage, Julian Barnes and more.