Source: CCTV.com

03-28-2008 09:44

For many the key to success is a little bit of madness. Take a 10-piece Gypsy band, add a healthy slice of opera, a dash of punk rock, put in a flock of geese, add a unicyclist for garnish, and your have the recipe for "Le Temps de Gitans".

as
It's the operatic adaptation by celebrated Serbian director
Emir Kusturica's of his 1988 film.

It's the operatic adaptation by celebrated Serbian director Emir Kusturica's of his 1988 film. It's a tale about love, betrayal and petty crime in an Eastern European gypsy community.

The stage show, at Paris's Palais de Congres, is an exercise in contained anarchy, threatening to boil over into uncontrolled chaos.

The songs are sung in Romani, the Gypsy language. There are French subtitles to help the audience understand.

Acrobats, jugglers and a unicyclist are seen jostling among the show's dozens of singers. And among the singers one is likely to spot a pair of dwarfs. Nearly all the vocalists are non-professionals. But they bring a palpable freshness to their roles, singing out the libretto with gusto.

as
 Take a 10-piece Gypsy band, add a healthy slice of opera,
a dash of punk rock, put in a flock of geese, add a unicyclist
for garnish, and your have the recipe for "Le Temps de Gitans".

The music careers between the accordion tunes of traditional Gypsy music and hard rock rhythms. The musical accompaniment is provided by The Garbage Serbian Philharmonic, a classical orchestra, and the No Smoking Orchestra, a Gypsy techno-rock group. Kusturica has played the guitar for the group since 1986. His son, Stribor, is its drummer.