There are a number of reasons to feel a little nervous about the world premiere of Christian Jost’s Journey of Hope, staged for the occasion in Geneva’s glamorous Grand Théâtre, a short tram ride from the headquarters of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees: a fear of exploiting real lives in the service of Tragedy with a capital T, or flattening them into a theoretical fairy tale; a worry that the desire for a red-hot contemporary subject might trump ethical concerns.
Based on Xavier Koller’s 1990 film, itself inspired by the true story of the death of a seven-year-old Kurdish child in the Alps, Journey of Hope follows married couple Meryem and Haydar as they sell their home and land, and leave behind their life in Turkey, in order to travel on foot to Switzerland with their young son Ali. Stumbling from failure to failure, the couple soon must face the loss of their illusions – at a higher cost than they ever could have imagined.
The printed programme doesn’t help to reassure us that the subject will be treated with care, with its photos of real-life refugees used in what is referred to as a “moodboard”, and ads for Hermès jewellery and Deutz Champagne on the following pages. But from its opening scene, the opera not only faces these concerns head-on, it answers them with sensitivity and grace. I say “the opera” because this production was conceived as a whole, with the director in the loop with the composer and librettist from day one, back in 2018, which gives the staging a powerful sense of coherence.
Kornél Mundruczó is a film director alongside his work in theatre, and his use of video onstage here, both live and pre-recorded, is intelligent and nuanced. Cameramen stalk the stage, thrusting their cameras into the singers’ faces, lingering too long on huddled figures in blankets, breaking into these people’s intimacy in order to transform them into political symbols. At all times, the artificiality of what we are watching is highlighted and questioned, as when we watch the paper-mâché-fragile Alps being wheeled in and assembled at the start of the third act. These are not new ideas – they could even be considered contemporary staging trends – but here they truly meshed with the story, and gave it heartbreaking depths.
Meanwhile, amongst this dense scenography, strong casting choices bring the characters to three-dimensional life. The lead trio, who carry everything on their shoulders, were exceptionally good. Tunisian-Canadian mezzo-soprano Rihab Chaieb (Meryem) has a lovely voice, both rounded and clear, which balanced nicely with Kartal Karagedik’s impressive baritone, powerful even when it goes rough around the edges with emotion. Ulysse Liechti (Mehmed Ali) wholly deserved his ovation, delivering an angelic performance as the doomed son, his innocence never quite destroyed even as his life falls to pieces.
Musically, Christian Jost’s work is not subtle – but then, it’s not trying to be. From the dark, dense opening chords, Jost’s music surges forward with a growing sense of urgency. Under Gabriel Feltz’s direction, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande gave life to both martial percussion and resonant brass clusters, as we watch our heroes first trudging then hurtling towards their inevitable fate. The aesthetics teeter at times on the edge of the obvious – glissandi in the strings as rain begins to fall – yet the work is not without moments of quieter lyricism, from the soaring solo violin motifs to a gorgeous a cappella trio between a Red Cross doctor (Julieth Lozano, her high notes achingly sweet) and the central couple. Screenwriter Kata Wéber’s libretto is clean-cut, ringing out bell-clear – coupled with the singers’ impeccable diction, the text makes for a poignant and accessible bit of storytelling, no surtitles needed. Once or twice, the voices were swallowed by the stagecraft, as when the singers are closed up in a truck cabin, but overall, a functional balance between the theatrical and musical demands of the piece was struck.
As for my worries as to the opera’s subtlety, these were thoroughly answered. Bureaucracy, bad luck and winter weather all play a part in crushing the family’s dreams, but it is the weakness and greed of the ordinary people they meet along the way that truly leads them into ruin: the farmer who buys and dismantles their home out of his own desperation; the trucker who takes them in, then ‘denies’ them (in the Biblical sense) as soon as they run into trouble. Journey of Hope may not be a score for the ages, but the story’s truth hits home.
