I am amazed (and then I am not) how present Brel remains in our current cultural awareness!
“ Brel is Alive and Well and Living in Paris” (first produced Off-Broadway in 1968, and reproduced since many times) is a feature of this year’s season at the Stratford Shakespeare Festival (http://www.stratfordfestival.ca/OnStage/productions.aspx?id=6046&prodid=31480), which I saw a few weeks ago at Stratford. Then in Paris itself, there is currently no less than 2 shows dedicated to Jacques Brel: “Brel Comme Moi” and “Jacques Brel ou l’Impossible Rêve”.
I saw the latter one this evening, at the théatre Daunou, near the hotel (gather from the clippings in the foyer that it was first presented in 2005, here in Paris). I must say that I enjoyed this one more than the show in Stratford, probably in good part because it is in the original language, but also because of the biographical story line that underscores it, which is not in the first one.
The songs are performed either chronologically, to mark Brel's evolution over time, or grouped by theme (women, for instance - to illustrate his "complex" relationship with them!) They are not all sang, but at times simply narrated, like a poem would be, "played up" on stage by the 2 protagonists. All the classics, then some, are there - "Quand on a que l'amour"; "Les Vieux Amants"; "Ces Gens-Là"; "Amsterdam", "Le Plat Pays"; "Ne Me Quitte Pas"; finale of his opera "Don Quichote de la Mancha",and others including the fluid, almost ethereal, “Les Marquises”, which sang the beauty of these islands where Brel spent the last few years of his life before he died of cancer in October 1978 (I have a vivid memory of that event – I was living in Hong-Kong then, enjoying his last recording).
"Voulez-vous que je vous dise, gémir n’est pas de mise, aux Marquises"…followed by those melodious, soft string notes that end the piece. I like to think of that song as the last one that Brel wrote…
Paris, July 24, 2010
