Cyrano de Bergerac

[kiki1982]

Just to vent my feelings. I was looking for a forum with it, but apparently Rostand is not there.

What to say about it? It's fantastic, sublime, original, it's waw.

I decided to watch the film with Depardieu on YouTube because I was bored on Saturday (I think I am a little bit of a fan ) and I found that so fantastic that I decided to read it too.

But waw.

It is so much embedded in literature, so much in philosophy. The illusion that the characters live is an illusion inside the illusion that is the theatre itself. The idyllic pastoral is mocked, but at the same time, the characters move in an idealised age; the age of d'Artagnan who briefly features at the start of the play; an age of galantry and verse. That ideal has blinded all from what really matter and what love and grandeur really is.

In fact nothing is real; all is nothing and only spirits exist.

So beautiful.

Speechless.


CYRANO: Il y a malgré vous quelque chose
Que j'emporte, et ce soir, quand j'entrerai chez Dieu,
Mon salut balaiera largement le seuil bleu,
Quelque chose que sans un pli, sans une tache,
J'emporte malgré vous,
(Il s'élance l'épée haute):
et c'est. . .
(L'épée s'échappe de ses mains, il chancelle, tombe dans les bras de
Le Bret et de Ragueneau.)
(rouvre les yeux, reconnaît [Roxane] et dit en souriant):
Mon panache.

[mayneverhave]

I'm reading this for a Literature and Film class - only in Anthony Burgess's translation - then watching two of its film adaptations.

Looking forward to it now.

[PeterL]

He was an excellent writer, but the extent versions of Voyage to the Sun is much less than perfect.

[kiki1982]

Atomism and religious philosophy (difference between the soul and the spirit) seems to be very important.

The rest is Greek/Roman mythology literature.

Rostand made numerous references to the real Cyrano (Savinien Cyrano de Bergerac) who was 17th century French philosopher and scientist. Notably his 6 ways to fly to the moon was the result of a work of early science fiction.

It is very much a visual piece with great tableaus and expression on stage. Particularly the scene at the siege of Aras between Cyrano and de Guiche must be absolutely hilarious if played well.

[dfloyd]

so I don't want to criticize, but I did not like him in The Count of Monte Cristo. I felt he was too heavy to play the lean and rakish Count. I do like many of his movies when he better fits a large man role. I do like the US movie of Cyrano starring Jose Ferrer who was Puerto Rican. He also played Toulouse Lautrec in the 50s movie of Moulin Rouge.

The soliliquy at the first of the play where Cyrano makes fun of his own nose size was a favorite single of Sammy davis Jr.

I've read where the play, when first performed in New York at the turn of the 19th century, recieved the longest encore or standing ovation ever issued in New York: 90 minutes.

I have two finely printed copies of the play in English. both copies have illustrations which were hand colored. To say I like the play is an understatement. Try watching the Ferere (sp?) b&w version.

[kiki1982]

Can't agree with you on Monte Cristo. A man in prison did not come out the way he went in (look at Oscar Wilde after his prison sentence, he was huge). And rakish? Where was Monte Cristo ever rakish? I do grant you the fact that he did not look dark, but does that really matter? When an actor plays his role properly then he does not need his looks.

It is true, they did change a lot, but the message stayed upward.

The Cyrano-production was lavish, a little shortened to fit into a film, but still, it did its job. Same director as Les Misérables 2000, Josée Dayan, and it shows.

Apparently, the writer Edmond Rostand was fearing a total failure at the time of the premiere. He even apologised to his lead actor Coquelin for 'having dragged him into an adventure [like this]'. But, after the curtain came down, there was a twenty minute applause and a minister came up to Rostand's box to pin his own Légion d'Honeur on the latter's breast and said: 'I have permitted myself a little advance.' Rostand did receive his Légion d'Honeur a little bit after this. Still, the play was played several hundreds of times during the first two years.

[kiki1982]

About the balcony scene of the 50s film:

I found it much less transcendental than the French version.

The lyrical aspect has gone. But then again, as one has to translate from French rime, there are two choices. Either one translates into verse, but then there is regularly a problem of rime and one loses certain imagary; or one translates in prose (which was done here), but then the rhythm that produces part of the lyrical effect, is gone.

What I found most lacking in that performance, was not the lyrical aspect (one needs to lower one's expectations), but rather Cyrano. In that scene, under the cover of the foliage, he for the first time ever speaks his true feelings and it surprises himself even:

'Oh*! mais vraiment, ce soir, c'est trop beau, c'est trop doux*!
Je vous dis tout cela, vous m'écoutez, moi, vous*!
C'est trop*! Dans mon espoir même le moins modeste,
Je n'ai jamais espéré tant*! Il ne me reste
Qu'à mourir maintenant*!'

'Oh! But really, tonight, it is too beautiful, too soft!
I tell you all this, you listen, to me, you!
It is too much! Even in my least modest hope,
I had never hoped so much! There is nothing left
for me but to die, now!'

(reference to Othello?)

He cannot believe it is happening. He declares love, she says 'I am yours' and he has not withdrawn like he usually does (in the cake shop). And at the same time, for the viewer, this scene is so sad, because he knows that he is doing it for another and that eventually he is too much of a coward to tell her to her face (a thing he expresses in his last scene with the spectres showing up when he is dying). He's got panache, but not so much as to tell her to her face. He can disgrace de Guiche with his white sash, he can challenge a whole audience to a duel, he can verbally do much better than Christian can ever do, but he cannot tell Roxane to her face because he is afraid that she is going to say no because of his nose. Only just before he dies. That makes that bacony scene so poignant, because it is so beautiful, it is a win for Cyrano, but at he same time a loss. And he lives with it.

Yet, the 50s version did not justice to that moment. Their moverments were too much exaggerated, their speech as well, for that scene to become the transcendental scene it was: speaking of the disctinction between the soul and the spirit and love, not as a material thing (the kiss), expressable in verse and galantary, but only in the unison of two souls. (the image of the bell)

[Fen]

I too loved the Depardieu film, I saw it about a year ago, it is unutterably beautiful. I went round telling my whole family about it, how sad and moving it was but I just couldn't convey how it made me feel.

I got the impression at the end, this is just my very unlearned opinion, that Cyrano though obviously unhappy was on some level satisfied with his death. It seemed to fit the grand romantic, melodramatic person that he had made himself. He and his emotions were larger then life, very real emotions but slightly caught up in gesture. Which is sad because I felt that if he had revealed himself to Roxanne earlier it would have been reigned in. Instead his romance with her enhanced it and spilled over into the way he handled his politics. It made me think that his death could have been preventable, that he would have acted differently if his separation from Roxanne hadn't made him a romantic hero. Which is also why in a way I thought his death was tragic but fitting.

I probably did not put that very well but I would like to know your opinions on his death.

As a caveat I haven't actually read the play this impression is based entirely on the film.

[kiki1982]

I don't think that his death was avoidable. It is implied (also in the film) that de Guiche gave the order to kill him. Just before Cyrano turns up de Guiche says explicitly to De Bret that 'an accident might happen'.

In the beginning, Cyrano fights a friend of de Guiche and has forbidden Montfleuri to act, not because Montfleuri cannot act to save his life (which is Cyrano's first reason), but because he wants to slight de Guiche, who is Montfleuri's protector and the other guy's friend. De Guiche wants Roxane to be his mistress and therefore wants her to marry a sad guy (his friend) so he can quietly continue with being her lover. When she turns out to be married to Christian, he leaves the regiment to fight against a much larger Spanish force with the goal of killing all off, including his love rival Christian. It is only when Roxane turns up that de Guiche bethinks himself (galantry you see). Sadly, it didn't work, because Cyrano is still alive and Roxane is not budging.

I think de Guiche deep inside himself does know that Christian was not the one and still reproaches Cyrano for his panache (the gaf with the white sash). Or else, if de Guiche does not know, he does realise that she will never marry again unless Cyrano is out of the way (as both hate each other).

I do think his love and feelings are larger than life, but I don't know if it was possible for him to reveal himself. It has been argued by a number of critics that there is a 'pact' à la Faust between Christian and Cyrano. As soon as Cyrano offers to be Christian's soul, both are hooked. Christian tries to get out of it just before he is ditched by Roxane because he doesn't speak well, and he acknowledges that he needs Cyrano. He equally tries to get out of it at the point where she professes that '[she] would even love [him] if [he] was ugly', but it doesn't work then either. Cyrano is condemned to not reveal himself, because until both are dead and reunited in Roxane's heart, they cannot be apart. Cyrano needs Christian for his looks he believes essential and Christian needs Cyrano for his soul and verbal ability which he believes necessary. Christian's death seems quite poignant as that indicates and follows Roxane's statement of loving Christian's soul (Cyrano) alone. But sadly, Cyrano still does not believe that anyone were able to love him despite his nose...

Cyrano is really adorable, with a lot of blabla, but a heart of soft cake (as they say in Dutch). At the end of the day, like Othello, it is himself that is the problem: he cannot get past that nose and makes out to be proud of it, but is not really. he thinks everyone stares at it, no-one is able to not stare at it/find it strange, and as such is not open for any true feelings from another because he is afraid to be rejected (particulaly by women). He does not seem to have that problem with men. Maybe because they do not see faces so much, but rather fighting technique and words. Women were more coquet then, as Roxane displays, and would not want to walk about on the arm of a man with such a nose (he thinks). Sad really. However, who would not like such a man?

Great film that was. Pretty true to the original, although a lot shorter. Other than that, the tableaus were so good!

[byquist]

Once played Cyrano in summer stock in Rhode Island and every scene works. Had to order the fake nose from NYC. Whoever (Rostand that is) could think up such a predicament about a big nose had some major imagination. It may be larger than life, a heroism of the highest order, but it is food for thought. Cynics may say he is unrealistic and if he had won Roxanne would have ended up henpecked or disappointed, or both, but he portrays an ideal, which always impresses.