The Beautiful Helene

Characters

Note: the bonds return to the article devoteds to the characters of Greek mythology and not with the roles of opera

Helene, queen of Sparte - Soprano or Mezzo-soprano
Pâris, prince de Troie - Ténor
Ménélas, king de Sparte, husband of Helene - tenor
Agamemnon, king of the kings - Baryton
Calchas, large forecasts of Jupiter - low
Oreste, wire of Agamemnon - Soprano or tenor
Achille, king of Myrmidons - tenor
Ajax 1 {{er}}, king de Salamine - tenor
Ajax 2 {{E}}, king of Locriens - baritone
Parthénis and Lœena, hétaïres - sopranos
Bacchis, following of Helene - mezzo-soprano
Philocome, servant of Calchas - spoken
Euthycles, blacksmith - spoken
Princes, guards, following, etc

Creators

Helene: Hortense Schneider
Pâris : Jose Dupuis
Ménélas: Jean-Laurent Kopp
Agamemnon: Henri To bend
Calchas: Pierre-Eugene Attic
Oreste: Lea Silly
Achilles: Alexandre Guyon
Ajax 1st: Edouard Hamburger
Ajax 2nd: Andof
Parthenis : Alice
Lœena: Gabrielle
Bacchis : C. Renault
Philocome: Videix
Euthyclès : Royer

Argument

The first two acts occur to Sparte. The third occurs to Nauplie, city at the edge of the Aegean Sea.

The intrigue proceeds after the judgment of Pâris. Short recall: shepherd on the Mount Ida, this one is pressed by three goddesses (Héra, Minerve, Venus) to decree a gold apple to most beautiful. He offers the trophy to Venus which promises to him in exchange the love of the more beautiful woman of the world… which is not other than Helene, queen of Sparte and married to Ménélas!

Act I: A public place with Sparte (" The oracle")

One celebrates Adonis with Sparte. Afterwards after having called upon Venus to spread love, Helene Calchas, the Jupiter questions omen:

“the business of the Ida mount… This mysterious wood, these three goddesses, this apple and this bank… this shepherd especially… you do not have new details…”

Calchas does not have anything to learn to him but they are quickly interommpus by the arrival of prince Oreste, discharged young person, accompanied by the two courtesans Parthœsis and Leœna. Helene runs to take refuge in the temple while Oreste presents its conquests to Calchas (“With the cabaret of the labyrinth”). Those end up from going away but Calchas, being on the point of doing as much of it, is stopped by the arrival of Pâris, which gives a Venus letter to him: this one requires of the omen to help Paris to allure the queen. Calchas accepts and requires of Pâris to tell him its meeting with the goddesses. The shepherd is carried out: “With the Ida mount, three goddesses… ”. Helene appears and is struck by the beauty of the shepherd. She asks her identity Calchas which keeps well to reveal to him. She requests it to leave and examines Pâris attentively.

Very quickly, they are stopped by the procession of the kings who arrive for the ceremony of the festival of Adonis (“Here kings of Greece”). This one is accompanied by a contest, not sporting, but devoted “to the things of the intelligence”: it is a Charade which it is necessary to solve. After Ménélas gave the reading of it, the kings launch incongruities in turn. Pâris occurs then which hardly has difficulties in give the answer (Log-Man-Hood-Ive) and to thus receive the trophy. The disconcerted kings wonder “which is thus this quidam”. Pâris reveals its identity, which leaves éperdue Helene (“O Sky! The man with apple”).

Pâris then requires of Calchas to draw aside Ménélas for some time. The large one forecasts makes actuate its thunder by Philocome and delivers at the assembly a “decree of the Gods”: Ménélas must leave one month in the mountains Crete (“Leave for Crete”). Helene declares victim of fate.

Act II: The room of the Queen (" Play of the oie")

It is soon the dinner and Bacchis tries to convince Helene to dress a dress which reveals its beauty (it is “the label”). On the contrary, Helene makes a point until the return of her husband of choking her passion for Pâris and gets dressed with a “rising” dress which wraps it narrowly head with the feet.

Pâris requires to see Helene but this one prefers before receiving it to require council of his/her parents (Léda & Jupiter) and of Venus (“Say to me, Venus”). Once Pâris in the presence of the queen, this one informs him of its impatience to receive its love (which however Venus promised to him) and makes him the description of the three means “of arriving in the middle of a woman”: love, the endurance and finally the trick…

They however are stopped by the arrival of the kings who come to play play of goose, left ancient poker. Calchas, collecting all the setting thanks to its cheating, wakes up the suspicion of the kings and flees, continued by them. Obliged to return half of its profits, it however returns to Helene who, tortured by her love, asks him to offer Pâris in dream to him. The queen falls asleep and Calchas lets Pâris be introduced " in douce" in the room of queen, being made pass for the dream in question (“Yes, it is a dream, a soft dream of love”).

It is the moment that finds Ménélas to return from Crete: it finds Pâris in the bed of his wife and furious, calls the other kings and their request what they did of his honor (“Prejudice! its honor! ”). Those are linked in Helene to reject the fault on him (“a wise husband on a journey” must have “the propriety” to inform his wife of its return) but agree with him to drive out the “seducer”.

Act III: Baths of Nauplie (" Galère de Vénus")

Come makes sow a wind of vice on Greece to be avenged for the kings who drove out Paris. The kings took refuge in a coastal small village to escape the orgies but Oreste and its friends carry out the dance on the spot (“Let us dance, like, drink, sing”). Ménélas, furiously seeks to him to know why Helene spoke about " rêve" when it found it with Paris in its bed. Helene, aggravated, clamp her innocence (“There, truth, I am not coupable") and reproaches him for doing such an amount of noise for a simple dream. This vague answer seems to leave Ménélas even more perplexed.

Agammenon and Calchas reproach him as for them its inaction in front of disease which gangrène Greece (“When Greece is a field of carnage”), showing it to neglect its country with the profit of its person: the husband would owe " to be erased in front of the monarque". They advise to him to be sacrificed (“Then, immole”) to alleviate the ire of the goddess. Ménélas, frightened, refuses and teaches them that it invited the large one forecasts of Venus to regulate the business.

This last arrived right of Cythère (“the galère of Cythère”) and Ménélas requires of all to be thrown to its feet to beseech the mercy of the goddess. But large the omen complains about the reception that one holds for him: he wants joy and cheerfulness (“I am merry, are merry, one needs it, I want it”). He exposes then the market which will alleviate the goddess: Helene must simply accompany the omen on her island. Ménélas, delighted that this " very small voyage" that is to say the only condition, pushes Helene to be accepted. Only the latter at all does not intend to make this voyage to satisfy her husband. The large one forecasts then reveals secretly its true identity to him: it is Pâris. They then embark all two in the galère with the blessing of Ménélas.

They are already out of reach when trickery is revealed…

Analyzes

the Beautiful Helene takes again the process (already employed by Offenbach and its librettists in Orphée with the Hells ) of the parody of graeco-latin Antiquity: anachronisms, subversion of the serious artistic use of the ancient topics, contrasts between the serious one usually associated with these topics and with the prosaic or familiar expressions, etc This process is coupled with many satirical references to the French company of the Second Empire.

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