Adapted for the stage by Richard Brunel, this famous farce by Georges Feydeau wittily explores the world of childhood and its capacity to unsettle us. Rich in intrigue and twists and turns, this is an opera for the whole family.
Just an ordinary bourgeois family: Monsieur Follavoine, his wife, and their son Toto, nicknamed Baby despite his seven years. But this morning, Toto is constipated. The very morning his father is waiting for Monsieur Chouilloux, to whom he wants to sell his unbreakable porcelain chamber pots for the French army. Baby is indeed running the show: the hysteria triggered by his constipation shatters any semblance of marital harmony. Feydeau's vaudeville, written at the very time Freud was describing the crude mechanisms of the unconscious, is of a rare ferocity. "All the characters are absolutely unbearable," says composer Philippe Boesmans, who delights in the play's comic virtuosity, scatology and its lucidity. Richard Brunel, who has directed Feydeau in the theatre, is responsible for the libretto and staging. The Belgian composer wants each of the characters to sing "as they are" and to give the "brilliant and virtuoso" orchestra its full expressive function.
A 1-act opera by Philippe Boesmans
Libretto by Richard Brunel, based on Georges Feydeau
First performance in France
World première in Brussels, December 2022
A co-production between the Lyon Opera, La Monnaie in Brussels and Théâtre du Châtelet
Engagez-vous et contribuez à la concrétisation de ses missions et de ses projets