At the beginning of October, Le Figaro, published in Paris, allowed itself to be described as “the Third World in Europe”. Other names could have been chosen for the apparent poverty of Naples, for its disorganization and lack of economic prospects. But the word that shimmered between exoticism and rejection was not just the rhetorical highlight of a factual analysis. It touched the wound of a relationship problem. Many Italians see Europe with its civilizational demands connected in a kind of love-hate relationship, on the other hand the city welcomes its visitors with extraordinary warmth. Now culturally outlawed to be declared extra-territorial on your own continent, that hurts.
To this day, the debate between Italy and France has raged back and forth. The ambassador of France defends Naples diplomatically against criticism from his country, of course again with a colorful word - Naples is a "fantastic" city. The situation is even more critical than shown in Figaro, Naples with its five billion euros in debt is practically bankrupt. Calls for help from the state government are loud, now that the community no longer knows how to help itself - as if the state itself did not have enough debts.
The Teatro San Carlo, Naples' magnificent opera house under the direction of the newly recruited artistic director Stéphane Lissner in Paris, has skillfully developed a mediating position in the structure of the city. On the one hand, the theater is an institution that acts apart from other, smaller cultural initiatives. No other cultural institution receives anywhere near as much funding from the state. On the other hand, it is clear to Lissner that he operates in a culture of extreme poverty. He would like to develop theater into a “social platform” on which children and young people who grew up outside the codes and content of a centuries-old high culture can get involved. That is also a question of democratic legitimation.
You think you can see Lissner's enthusiasm for the city - he tells about the perspectives of the Teatro San Carlo in his own language, in which French and Italian bubble together. The fact that not so much of his projects has been developed after one and a half years as artistic director may be due to the limitations of the Covid epidemic. Above all, there is nothing to be seen in the repertoire of the obvious project of using the resources of the incomparably rich operatic history of Naples in the eighteenth century. Bellini, Donizetti's, Verdi's and Puccini's dominated the Italian century, while operas by the older Neapolitan masters such as Cimarosa, Hasse, Jommelli, Leo, Paisiello, Pergolesi, Piccinni, Porpora, Traetta have to be looked for in other houses or in the legendary library of the local one Conservatorio.
Lissner believes that he should gradually introduce the public to the city's historical art in a roundabout way. Until then, he will be working on a connection between the immediate force of the later Belcanto and a scenic interpretation that opens up the works from contemporary perspectives. That the Opera House in Naples is artistically at the height of the “first world” is shown on Sunday in the season opening with Giuseppe Verdi's “Otello”. The staging by Mario Martone places the events in our present - an imposition for large parts of the Italian audience, who expect to see “traditionally” costumed performances. Because with the situation in our present, their questions also come into play. Martone points outthat Verdi's Otello depicts the murder of a woman by a man - a problem that manifests itself in a new case every two to three days in Italy, and it continues unabated, for decades at the same level.