She also brings along her sweet, effortless personality everywhere she goes, which is a gift to everyone working with her, on and off the stage. I thought about asking Ellie to elaborate on this a bit more and then I realized her answer was just perfect and that I agreed with her, especially after having held those Boucheron pieces in my hand back in Paris!Įllie has been singing all over the world and building a successful career for a while now. Her answer was not what I expected but is was so honest and charming, just like Ellie is: “Who doesn’t like all of that glitz and glamour?”. On this note, I went ahead and asked Ellie how she relates to Manon as a woman. That last act is just too beautiful to give to a woman with an ugly soul.” Sure, she can be detestable in the 3rd and 4th acts with being a bit of a vampire, but karma gets her in the end. She lives her life moment to moment and takes the bull by the horns to get what she wants. Also, her music is written with such sensitivity and heart that it makes her spirit shine.
She does in turn end up with a much richer man and has the lavish lifestyle and celebrity status that she’s always dreamt about, but we still care for her because she truly was in love. He was going to be kidnapped no matter what. In this version, she only leaves Des Grieux because she really has no other choice. The Manon Lescaut from the original book and from Puccini’s opera are a bit less likable, but Massenet gave her such a human edge. “We know that Manon has to be a bit of a narcissist with an incredible desire for the finer things in life, but the thing that makes her so interesting is that she’s so multi-faceted.
I got to check in with Ellie during tech week and had one specific question on her character development: what is it about Manon that, despite making questionable choices throughout the opera, makes the audience cry for her at the end? I can only imagine Ellie must be drawing from all those wonderful images and memories of being there to create her own version of Manon in San Francisco, where she is pictured in Hayes Valley near the opera house. Sulpice church and taking all that energy in with Manon in mind. That, of course, is not what we did because time was of the essence. Paris is infinitely beautiful and you could take a stunning photo in every corner. The bouncer was a very interesting character, but that’s another story. It was quite the afternoon, in which the Boucheron jewels took center stage, not only for their stunning bling, but because we had a bouncer following us everywhere.
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