A Night At the Ballet (in the Opera)

Last night we went to the opera to see a performance of the ballet La Dame Aux Camellias at the Opera Garnier. I was originally slated to go see a symphony, but since tickets were unavailable, I threw on a foulard and the one shirt that was ironed and headed out.

We met with the rest of the program at the second dorm, on Rue Conde, and along with bunch of young girls wearing the slinkiest dresses Bebe can offer, we traipsed to the bus stop like a bunch of teens going to prom.

I had passed in front of the Opera de Paris Garnier earlier in the week and though the building was beautiful, I wasn't impressed by its busy shopping area location and pigeon-decorated statues. But once past the ticket guard and the search station, the interior of the building was just amazing.

You enter into a foyer and up the grand staircase to the second floor where you can look at the other attendees from one of the little balconies as they enter the building. From there you can walk behind the bar to some very ornate and intricate rooms with full on ceiling murals and rococo detailing, others with just rows of giant chandeliers, and some with mirrors placed for optimal optical impact. Someone mentioned that this venue was the inspiration for The Phantom of the Opera.

To watch the performance, I had to find my floor (the 6th), then the door to my balcony (porte 21), wait for an usher to unlock it, and then get my seat numbers (8). The tickets were very long. The seats were incredible as was the auditorium. I felt like I was in Amadeus, except that I was sitting with a girl called Ana from LA, had Professor Balir and two nuns in the balcony to my left, and I wasn't wearing a powdered wig. Everything was red velvet and gold, and the round area around the chandelier was painted into a beautiful mural by Chagall.

The performance itself was pretty awesome. The stage was very large (Prof. Blair mentioned that the stage is more than double the depth of a normal stage) and with the minimal stage sets, it looked even larger. The ballet was a re-telling of Camille, and it merged the original story with that of Manon Lescaut. Considering it's a tale about courtesans, I was still very surprised at the sexual content. I mean, ballet isn't the sexiest of dances usually (that would be Lambada, the forbidden dance), but there were trysts on carpets, dancers in flesh-colored body stockings cavorting on beds, and a lot of cleavage. And all this while on tip-toes.
Very enjoyable overall, as was watching the nuns trying to act blase and looking away whenever the action got too torrid or the plotline led to sexy results. I'm sure they weren't expecting an R-rated dance performance and one of the nuns looked particularly flustered during a particularly orgiastic pas de deux. Oh, and it was probably about 90-degrees, which made me slightly doze off. I would have probably fallen asleep completely, But I was afraid of falling over the railing and landing on the orchestra pit.

Three intermissions and a 15-minute standing ovation later, we headed home.