French Opera Bouffe: Les Brigands

“The management of the Grand Opera House have at length found a work which possesses the elements of success. ‘Les Brigands’ cannot be compared with Offenbach’s earlier works, but it is lively and rattling, and splendidly placed on the stage. Mr. Fisk has bought at a dear rate the experience of engaging artists in Europe through an unreliable agent. He has an opera bouffe company which is probably more expensive, but utterly inferior to the Grau and Bateman troupes. Silly and Persini are the only artists worth speaking of, and the latter, we believe, is a relic of the ill-starred enterprise at the Academy a season ago. It is a dangerous thing for a manager to depend upon the representations of agents in Europe, and it better to select for oneself. The men in the company cannot be compared to Guifroy, Aujac, Carrier, Leduc, Duchesne, Beckers or Gabel, and the chorus is not equal to that which Grau brought here. Still, ‘Les Brigands’ may prove a savior to the season.”

“The repeated performances of this amusing opera bouffe are making its melodies familiar to the public. Madame Lea Silly this week takes the part of Fiorella, and wins the customary double encore in the laughing scene. Her personation of the part is more vigorous than that of Montaland, and her changes of costume more striking; yet there is a piquancy about the latter lady which Silly does not possess.

“The constant life and vivacity of this opera does not allow it to become tedious for a moment. The music is pretty, and will win a certain popularity by the excellent manner in which it is put upon the stage. Of the careful acting shown even in the minor parts we have already spoken.”

“Last evening proved one of the most effective representations of the present season. The artists were not only in good voice, but in excellent trim, the Colonel, as a matter of course, occupying the stage box, and was the great attraction of the members of the company. The house was well filled by a fashionable audience, who evidently enjoyed the gay tone of the opera. Mlle. Lea Silly excelled herself and was frequently encored, and the chorus was good, the most attractive proving the laughing chorus. The drollery of the Duke’s treasurer on finding his cash so very low, owing to certain frailties of his master, were comic in the extreme. The music is admirably suited to the light acting, and we may hope that the piece will last the season. Italian opera is too heavy and dull for a New York audience, and the light French productions exactly suit it. Moreover the language better suits their taste, although perhaps not generally understood.”

“’Les Brigands’ remains upon the bills of the Grand-opera house. The increased familiarity of the artists with their respective parts has quickened the pace of a performance which needed, above all things, briskness. When the character of Fiorella was first assumed by Mlle. Silly, we noticed the special merits of the personation in respect of intelligence and vivacity. Now in absolute possession of the rôle, Mlle. Silly gives to it its fullest prominence, and while she points the dialogue of MM. Halevy and Cremieux as happily as so witty and experienced an actress might be expected to do, she develops a skill in ‘making up’ in the second act of the opera which has almost as approving recognition as her comic heartiness in the laughing chorus. This number of ‘Les Brigands’ is repeated thrice at least at each representation.”

“The ‘Brigands’ at the Grand Opera House has made a genuine success, and it has attracted good sized and constantly increasing audiences during the past week. The Whispering Chorus as well as the Laughing Chorus have become highly popular and are nightly re-demanded, and on some occasions more than once. Col. Fisk, Jr., has, at a lavish outlay of capital, secured Mlle. Aimee, who sang Fiorella originally on the production of this opera in Paris, France. She has already taken her departure from the besieged city and is now en route by steamer for this port, and it is probable she will appear at the Grand Opera House in her original role about the middle of December.”