Metropolitan Opera Archives

In French
Revised production
LE COQ D'OR {51}
Rimsky-Korsakov-Byelsky
Translation by Calvocoressi
Lily Pons' costumes were designed by Valentina.
For the first time at the Metropolitan Opera, singers rather than dancers performed the roles onstage.
Le Coq d'Or received seven performances this season.

Review 1:

Review from the column of Marcia Davenport in the March 1937 issue of Stage magazine

To return, finally, to Thirty-ninth Street, where the bulk of the winter's news seems to lie, as it used to do in Carnegie Hall:, the novelties and revivals so far projected have been variously good, indifferent, and bad. The first adjective belongs to "Coq d'Or," the second to "Tales of Hoffmann," and the third to "Caponsacchi." I cannot resist indulging in bad taste to the extent of remarking that the New York critics can be, at times, what is inelegantly known as wet. They rail at Mr. Johnson and the whole operatic tradition for lack of showmanship and acumen and then, when they get a production, like "Coq d'Or," which is distinctly designed as a show and a departure, they maunder through their files and their memories to indict that this "Coq d'Or" is not like the one of twenty years ago.

For my part I am fervently glad that it is not. So would Rimsky-Korsakov be if he were around, for the present production is what he intended: opera sung and acted by the singers, not a combination ballet and oratorio. Furthermore the production is excellent; it has style, crispness, and enough theatrical personality to have brought certain exceedingly big Broadway names to their feet, calling "Bravo!" at the premiere. Nobody pretends that Lily Pons is Maria Barrientos, but since she is not, why not discuss the merits and demerits of her performance instead of harking back to the realms of history?

Miss Pons does an excessively difficult job surprisingly well. I could not have believed she would be able to dance, if not like Toumanova, at least charmingly and, at the same time, sing some very nasty coloratura music. She looks, of course, too good to be true. And Ezio Pinza, as King Dodon, is something superb. The shock of Pinza's voice emerging from a mountain of wadding and a cabbage-head of make-up was a grand send-off for the show, and from that point on it moved with accent and freshness, the source of which is the stage direction of Herbert Graf.

This was the first real sample of this very talented artist's work, and whether or not the critics knew he was in charge, he was met by a roar of enthusiasm from the audience when brought out for a curtain call. Do not condemn opera as a dodo and a dramatic joke until you have seen this "Coq d'Or;" the plain truth is that it was better theatrically than musically and it wasn't so bad musically either. Pinza and Pons dancing in the second act are definitely not to be missed.

Search by season: 1936-37

Search by title: Cavalleria Rusticana, Le Coq d'Or,

Met careers