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Fans of the 1875 Georges Bizet opera Carmen might come to the version now on at the National Ballet and get a shock. Not only is the two hour-plus opera cut down to a tidy 45 minutes, but the famous fiery flamenco-nature of work, all fluttering fans and frilly dresses, is amiss. Well, not entirely –but the ones wearing those dresses happen to be four male dancers.
However, before the tale of the famous wanton gypsy is presented, audiences are treated to the slow, thoughtfully poetic Skin Divers, inspired by Anne Michaels’ book of poetry of the same name (McLelland and Stewart, 1999) and choreographed by Dominique Dumais. Michaels’ voice is heard, hypnotically reciting verses, as a scrim showing black and white (filmed) angles of a nude woman is seen; this scrim serves as the backdrop (and sometime-frontage) for a group of dancers –eight pairs, to be precise, who circle, stretch, and pirouette around one another in a dance for the ages.

The work has been described as exploring “the body as a living archive of experience, or a museum of memory,” but the ballet itself also works as an investigation into the nature of aging, relating, and love. The four pairs of dancers - Andreea Olteanu and Noah Long, Alejandra Perez-Gomez and Patrick Lavoie, Stephanie Hutchison and Jonathan Renna –effectively convey various points along the long road of life, loving, and partnership. Clothed in simple variations on nude-coloured basics, they have an “every person” quality that underlines Michaels’ thoughts on the body. The passions explored here are quiet and thought-full, with intimate moments occurring in slow motion, but countered by Michaels’ contemplative words, and the slow-moving poetry of English composer Gavin Bryars’ String Quartet No. 2.

By contrast and indeed compliment, Davide Bombana’s re-envisioning of Carmen is sassy, dark, and snappy. Its vision of relationship isn’t poetic so much as it is raucous. Bombana has returned to the original source material of Prospere Merimee, including characters dropped by Bizet (and his librettists) for the opera, including, notably, Garcia the bandit. The piece opens with Don Jose and Michaela facing one another glumly; apparently, the heat’s gone out and Jose’s on the prowl for something better.

Along comes Carmen, a paragon of contradictions, and a magnet of sexual heat: Heather Ogden’s sinuous, gamely performance on opening night suggested coquettishness and sexual bravado, but also, interestingly, a kind of vulnerability rarely seen in the role. Her pas de deux with Noah Long, as Don Jose, touched on many opposing elements; tenderness was countered by ferocity, poetry was balanced by passion. 
The quiet doesn’t last, however, as Escamillo enters the scene, catching the flighty Carmen’s attentions. In Bombana’s version, he isn’t merely the bullfighter –the stand-in symbol for ‘the manly man’ –but he’s the bull himself, spinning, jumping, running, with chest puffed out and hands on hips. Dancer Jonathan Renna effectively conveys this sense of male bravado, and designer Dorin Gal has smartly costumed him in a Cirque du Soleil-style get-up, with horns, grey body makeup, and tight trousers, evoking Picasso’s vision of the Minotaur.

Equally effective are the designs of the cigarette girls, whose chartreuse-coloured chemises recall both German cabaret and the kind of industrial conformity from which Carmen flees. The huge, black shoulder tattoo on Garcia (Robert Stephen), like a spindly spider, perfectly matches the (again) tight leather-look trousers and S&M-style buckled body harnesses worn by the other male gypsies.

References to the Spanish setting, outside of the funny appearance of the four dancers who try their best to belt out the Toreador song, are few and far between. Bombana’s vision of Carmen is focused solely on the relationships within the Merimee original. Music is courtesy of Russian composer Rodion Shchedrin’s Carmen Suite, with melody lines sometimes being played on either a guitar or tenor sax. Pounding rhythmic sections, mainly used in fights between characters, are by the French ensemble Les Tambours du Bronx, and they add to the drama and ugly tension that Bombana builds as the piece reaches its inevitable, murderous conclusion.

Within Gal’s modern bullring-esque set, Jose and Carmen circle each other, and as she plunges headlong into his dagger, you can’t help but be reminded of the slow movements way back in Skin Divers, and its lines:

We hold
the ones we love or long
to be free of, carry them
into every night field, sit with them
while cows slow as ships
barely move in the distance.

The tableau of Jose holding the lifeless Carmen, bending over her, a broken man, at the ballet’s closet is powerful, affecting, and draws a direct line back to the quiet poetry of Skin Divers. The pairing of the Dumais and Bombana works is a smart, ballsy move, plumbing the layers of meaning within the concept of desire, aging, and connection, the latter concept being a big part of the Luminato festival, under whose considerable umbrella these works fall.

The opera it isn’t, but Skin Divers/Carmen is a bold, poetic pairing worth checking out.

Carmen / Skin Divers runs at the Four Seasons for the Performing Arts June 10th through 14th. For more information, check the Luminato and National Ballet websites.