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Days before it opened to raving critics and enthusiastic audiences, more than  30 AAPA members and guests enjoyed a sneak preview of the popular musical “My Fair Lady” at the Chatelet Theater on Dec. 3.

 

 The show’s lively, creative director, Jean-Luc Choplin  spent nearly an hour with us, answering questions about challenges of

presenting  a musical in English with  French  subtitles . He explained his strategy  for bringing such shows to the centuries-old Chatelet, including past hits “The Sound of Music” and “Le Chanteur de Mexico”, which he described  as “populaire sophistique,” an approach he intends to pursue.  Our invitation included drinks and snakcs offered by the house.

 

Choplin, who previously worked as an artistic director for Disneyland, also noted how laughter was good for the health, and suggested to us, and the French media, that an idea worth pursuing is subsidizing theater tickets by the nation’s social security system.

 

Then, for about an hour, we sat back and enjoyed the scores of the celebrated musical played and acted, in a non-stop, working rehersal, which for some of us recalled similar events we organized at the Bastille Opera, going back to 1997.

 

– Axel Krause