Richard Strauss - Salome - Teresa Stratas, Bernd Weikl - Karl Böhm & Wiener PhilharmonikerDVD9 - NTSC - 4:3 - All Regions - German - LPCM, DTS - 101 min.
Subtitles: English, Spanish, German, French, Chinese
Produced 1974, released on DVD 2007
This filmed version of Strauss' shocker features Teresa Stratas as opera's most depraved teenager, and she's as perfect a Salome as one would ever hope to see or hear. Stratas inhabits the role, exploring the character's sensuousness as she vainly woos Jochanaan, her venomous hatred when she's rejected, the crazed look in her eyes when she demands his head--on a silver platter, no less. Such complete identification with a role, especially of a character so malignant helps make this 1974 Salome stand out among the many fine DVDs of the opera.
While Stratas' overwhelming performance commands prime attention, the cast is a strong one. The great Wagnerian soprano Astrid Varnay, long past her vocal prime, is a venomous Herodiade whose facial expressions mirror her inner corruption. Varnay's portrayal comes perilously close to being over the top but that may be said of others in the cast, too, as Friedrich seems to encourage excess in an opera that wallows in it. Hans Beirer's lascivious Herod, for example, is also broadly interpreted, but very well done in the context of Friedrich's framework of a decadent sex-obsessed court. The role of Jochanaan is taken by Bernd Weikl whose sonorous singing and acting vividly portray his scorn for his captors and his repulsion at Salome's sexual aggressiveness.
The sound mix favors the singers and downgrades the orchestra, itself a central character, though rather attenuated, as it comments on the action and elaborates on the sung lines. Karl Böhm, a great Strauss conductor, leads the sumptuous Vienna Philharmonic in a performance that, in spite of its dim placement, illuminates Strauss' orchestration. All in all, this is a must-have Salome.
Herodes - Hans Beirer
Herodias - Astrid Varnay
Salome - Teresa Stratas
Jochanaan - Bernd Weikl
Narraboth - Wieslaw Ochman
Page - Hanna Schwarz
Wiener Philharmoniker
Conductor: Karl Böhm
