10. 11. 2024, 7 p.m.
Mahen Theatre
Author: Leoš Janáček
Conductor: Marek Šedivý
Director: Itzik Galili
Ensemble: National Moravian-Silesian Theatre
The performance lasts 130 minutes including a 25-minute intermission.
Act 1
The Forester is walking trough his woods on a hot summer afternoon. He lies down and soon dozes off. The forest is full of life: little flies circle around, a cricket and grasshopper get swept up in an infectious waltz, a mosquito drunk on human blood goes reeling about and a little frog tries to catch him. The young vixen scares the frog, who jumps onto the sleeping man. Waking, the Forester catches the vixen and drags her home.
Scene change
The captive vixen lives with the dog in the Forester’s yard. Pepík, the Forester’s grandson, brings a friend, and they tease the vixen; she bites Pepík. In response to his wife’s complains, the Forester ties up the vixen. Feeling the strangeness of real captivity, the vixen dreams of freedom in the wild forest. Mocked by the cock, the vixen calls on all the chickens to rebel against his domination and their forced labour. Then she tricks them, and slaughter them all. The enraged Forester attacks at the vixen, but she bites through her ropes and escapes to freedom.
Act 2
The vixen has acquired a few traits during her stay at the Forester’s abode, including a little guile. She drives out a grumpy old badger from his den and happily takes his place there, supported by insect admirers.
Scene change
Meanwhile, at Pásek’s Inn, the Forester and his friends have settled down to a game of cards and some good drink. The Forester pokes fun at the Schoolmaster‘s fondness for a certain Terynka, and the Schoolmaster pays him back in kind by asking after the vixen. They all leave the inn staggering drunk. The vixen secretly observes these late-night wanderers and hides among the sunflowers. Their trembling attracts the attention of the Schoolmaster, who sees in them the face of Terynka, the local beauty, and tries to go after her. Even the Parson‘s recollection of a love from his student days is interrupted by the vixen. The Forester shoots at her; both men then run off in fright.
Scene change
On a lovely moonlit summer night the vixen encounters the dashing fox. Their initial attraction soon grows into love, which is consummated in the vixen’s den. The woodland creatures view the vixen‘s immoral ways with indignation, and are satisfied only once a hastily-arranged wedding has taken place.
Act 3
Summer turns into autumn. The vixen is now a skilled hunter. The Forester runs into Harašta, a poultry trader. Harašta boasts of his upcoming marriage with Terynka, while the Forester wanders whether Harašta has been poaching in his woods. The vixen appears with Goldskin and her fox cubs, and she runs into Harašta, who is carrying a basket full of chickens. When he threatens to kill her in order to present her tail as a gift to Terynka, she decides to have revenge. He falls into her trap, and she scratches his nose. As her cubs eat Harašta’s chickens, Harašta fires into the pack the vixen remains lying on the ground, dead.
Scene change
At the inn, the Forester learns that Harašta’s Terinka has received a new muff for her wedding – so that’s why he found the fox den empty! The Schoolmaster is pained by the news of Terinka’s wedding. A feeling of sorrow at lost youth descends over them all, and the Forester thinks it better to head for home now. On his way he thinks back to his own youth, and remeber his wedding night. The forest looks the same as it did when he found the vixen, all the woodland creatures ate here just like they were then. Only the little fox is missing… And then he sees her – the living image of her mother! A tiny frog appears, the grandchild of the earlier one.
Director: Itzik Galili
Conductor: Marek Šedivý
Scene: Daniel Dvořák
Costumes: Symona Rybáková
Choreography: Itzik Galili
Assistant Director & Choreography: Elisabeth Gibiat
Assistant Choreography: Duilio Ingraffia
Choirmaster: Jurij Galatenko
Head of the Opera Studio: Lenka Živocká
Dramaturgy: Juraj Bajús
Cast:
Bystrouška – Lada Bočková / Doubravka Novotná
Zlatohřbítek (Fox) – Anna Nitrová / Dominika Škrabalová
Forester – Martin Gurbaľ / František Zahradníček
Mrs. Forester / Owl – Eva Dřízgová-Jirušová / Jana Horáková Levicová
Schoolmaster / Mosquito – Martin Javorský / Václav Morys
Reverend / Badger – Josef Kovačič / Jan Šťáva
Harašta, Poultry Dealer – Daniel Kfelíř / Boris Prýgl
Mr. Pásek, Innkeeper – Aleš Burda / Erik Ondruš
Mrs. Pásek, Innkeeper’s Wife / Rooster / Jay – Miroslava Časarová / Klára Hlúšková
Pepík, Forester’s Grandson – Ondřej Borák / David Kaleta
Frantík, His Friend – Lukáš Bátor / Filip Škandera
Little Bystrouška – Sára Bernatíková / Charlotte Gurbaľová
Cricket – Ivona Dominiková / Anna Rozálie Šimičková
Grasshopper – Felicie Schmidtová / Žofie Trojáčková
Frog – Roman Patrik Baroš / Ondřej Borák / David Kaleta
Dog Lapák / Woodpecker – Barbora Garzinová / Šárka Hrbáčková
Hen Chocholka – Karolína Levková / Magdaléna Rovenská
Cast of Ballet Roles:
Bystrouškas’ Maiden Appearance – Dorottya Fanni Lengyel / Yu Matsumoto / Diana Ribeiro Brandão
Ladybird – Lucía Alfaro Córcoles / Teodora Martinez / Gvendolin Nagy
Stork – Giulia Del Grande / Dorottya Fanni Lengyel / Bianca Loschi
Stork – Maxwell Davies / Hugo Fraresso
Squirrel – Elisa Perini / Diana Ribeiro Brandão / Fanny Westring
Owls – Viola Izzo / Hannah Lukey / Maria Carla Ognisanto / Nahia Soto Barcéna
Blue Dragonflies – Leonardo Baghin / Francesco Fasano / Sachiya Takata / Patryk Zamojski
Hare – Simone Giroletti / Edgar Mateo Navarro
Hedgehog – Mark Griffiths / Sachiya Takata
Old Butterfly – Michal Bublík / Bernardo Costa
Although Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen belongs to Brno, the northern Moravia also has its merit in the creation of the famous opera. Janáček also liked to visit Hukvaldy, where he was born, in his later years during the summer and it was the local forests and their forester who provided him with information about the life of foxes, which he then brought to the stage in an original operatic form. And that is why our colleagues from the Moravian-Silesian Theatre in Ostrava will be joining us to celebrate the centenary of the The Cunning Little Vixen with a brand new production. Israeli director and outstanding choreographer Itzik Galili has collaborated with many outstanding ballet ensembles around the world and together with conductor Mark Šedivý, they will surely bring a fresh perspective to one of Janáček’s most popular operas.
The Cunning Little Vixen is one of Janáček’s most lyrical and melodious operas. It sparkles with humour, kindly and a little whimsically prickly at the same time, and captivates with a peculiar concept of the intertwining world of humans and animals, earthiness, a kind philosophy of life, even mysticism. At the beginning of the story about the cunning vixen, there was the decision of the Brno editorial office of Lidové noviny to regularly bring its readers cartoons with funny text. Stanislav Lolek (1873–1936), a great lover of nature and originally a gamekeeper by profession, was among the painters approached, and the texts were written by Rudolf Těsnohlídek. The Janáček household were regular readers of Lidové noviny and the composer was intrigued by the cartoons. During the holidays of 1921 he began to sketch a script for a new opera about Sharp-Ears and to work on the libretto. From the original twenty-three chapters of the series, he selected ten, emphasized the animal world and reduced the number of human characters appearing, merging some of them into one. Těsnohlídek’s story ends with the wedding of Sharp-Ears and Gold-Stripe. However, Janáček decided to make a serious change from the original text and let the main character die, because as a true playwright, he felt the need for catharsis. The result is a unique work about nature and the cycle of life.
Patricie Částková