Main characters

Carmen
Destiny
Don José
Escamillo

PICTURES AND SCENES FROM THE BALLET "CARMEN":

First picture
Scene # 1 The City. A Meeting. A magical city where we are all actors, guided by our destiny. Sometimes, it does so indifferently and without concern, but at times, it chooses its main characters. Fate writes the script of our lives, arranges our meetings and the circumstances surrounding them... And it is up to us to decide whether to accept these rules of the game or not.
Scene #2 Jig. A Variation of Fate. We are puppets, led and surrounded by the tempo and rhythm of life, placed and accompanied through time.
Scene #3 Soldiers. The Army. Submission to military order. A senseless execution of the commands of higher-ranking officers. A humorous sketch.
Scene #4 Square in front of the tobacco factory. Cigarette smoke. Sweet longing and desire waiting for a date.
Scene #5 José appears. Guided by Fate, José appears in the square.
Scene #6 Carmen appears. The appearance of Carmen shatters the calm and stirs the heart of the officer. The disciplined and structured life of the army is destined by Fate for destruction. The gaze of Carmen is impossible to forget. Closing his eyes, José sees her again and again... A quickened pulse, a heartbeat. Fate looms over the soldier’s peaceful life.
Scene #7 Flower. A casually thrown flower, like a predestined challenge of Fate… It follows the stance of the seconds in a duel… A deadly encounter, an endless and lost love, the struggle between Possession and Freedom…
Scene #8 Women's rebellion. A growing refusal to submit to the will of Fate, leading to a challenge.
Scene #9 Fight in the Tobacco Factory. The worst thing in life is Aggression. When guided and controlled, Aggression always leads to a destructive end. Conducted by the hand of Fate – Death is not justice... How do we live with it or accept it?
Scene #10 Carmen, José, and Fate. Torn between duty and passion, led and guided by Fate, José decides to free Carmen, who has committed a crime. Thus, through his own choice, he condemns himself to be imprisoned by the decision of his own Fate.
Scene #11 Fans. Carmen’s song is a futile resistance against the already predestined encounter that led to José’s subsequent escape.
Scene #12 Escape. Following Carmen in a flight toward an imaginary freedom, the mad laughter of Fate is heard in the chase of the fugitives.
It is impossible to escape love!!! ... ... and even more, you cannot escape yourself.

Second picture
Scene #1 Interlude. Fate, Carmen, José. Led and guided by Fate, José and Carmen continue their path toward both downfall and the liberation of the self.
Scene #2 The Prison. José becomes a prisoner of his own life. Having never truly felt Freedom before, he now finds himself in the real cage of his own circumstances.
Scene #3 The Tavern. A lively, characteristic suite - dances in the tavern - all culminating in the arrival of the third protagonist of the play: the dazzlingly handsome Toreador, who constantly plays and fears nothing, not even death.
Scene #4 The Toreador. Variation - Aria of the Toreador.
Scene #5 Castanetti. Duet of Carmen and Torreador. Whatever must happen cannot be avoided. Their eyes meet. Passion leads to a duet.
Scene #6 Carmen's fate. The Return. Fate tries to return Carmen to José's arms.
Scene #7 José's Adagio (Aria) to Carmen. José's last love Adagio/Arias leads to a break-up between Carmen and José.
Carmen wants to remain free in her choices and in her love...
Scene #8 Carmen's fate. Choice. Disagreement with Fate and the current circumstances.
Scene #9 Nocturne. Climax. Fate. Carmen. José. The bullfighter.
By being in the center of our own space and by crossing the boundaries of others' existence, we often disturb our own equilibrium. Four circles, four images... Everyone stays in their own closed world.
Scene #10 The Smugglers. Chased and driven by circumstances that lead to imprisonment within their own lives.
Scene #11 Carmen's monologue. Carmen's last monologue.
Scene #12 Masks. We are all actors in our own lives.
Scene #13 Corrida. The Death of the Toreador. Life is a game… We believe we shape it in our own way, but in reality, it has long been predestined from above.
Scene #14 Carmen's death. Disobeying Fate's decision, Carmen chooses Death, but remains Free...
Scene #15 Finale.
Scene #16 Overture.

First performance: December 2012, Lyon, France.
First performance in Ruse: 1.07.2014 - choreogr. Natalia Osipova (France), set design by Sebastian Malache (France), design. Osvetl. Emanuele Pla (France), chief rehearser Sylvia Tomova, rep. Mariana Zaharieva

... We each have our own Destiny.
We are all born and die...
And we often don't understand what a chance a completely unexpected encounter sometimes gives us.
Or maybe it is defined by Destiny? We see the eyes. We hear the voice.
We fall in love... We love...
We are very afraid of losing a loved one... and even more afraid of becoming dependent on love, of losing our personal freedom.
"Oh yes, Love is free as a bird..."
The story of Carmen... Familiar to everyone from Prosper Merimee's novella... What is this story about? Above all, about Love, about Life and Death in the name of personal Freedom and independence from the proposed circumstances. Fate? - would you say...? Yes, we are all being guided by the above, yet Man has the right to decide and choose his own Destiny... by resisting and disobeying the existing situation, changing his life against reason and dying defending his Feelings for the sake of his own Freedom and Love...
We are all human... actors of our own lives, and we often act out a play written by someone else, without giving a second thought to whether we are happy with the proposed circumstances...
...Fate rules us, choosing its heroes and assigning us different roles, and only free and strong individuals fight for their lives... And what is Life?
Each of us lives differently, often having a chance in life, we do not use it and, passing by without stopping, we miss our chance...
Carmen was chosen by Destiny for Love. This woman drives many people crazy, she is passionate, beautiful, charming, one could say a femme fatale... but at the same time she is naive like a child and no one really knows how lonely she is. How she searches for Love, Feelings, Mutual Understanding... but the most important thing for her is to remain herself, to search and find Love - not to lose herself... and not to become dependent... "I was born free, I will die free."

Don José, an officer who truly obeys the laws and carries out his military duties... Meeting Carmen turns his life upside down, love becomes higher than duty and responsibilities, he is ready to do anything for love... he loses his love and himself - by killing Carmen...

Escamillo - the Toreador, the pet of fate, constantly taking risks and living between life and death, the favourite of women and the audience, certainly attracts Carmen with his carefree attitude to life and love without obligations, making her suffer.

Fate haunts each of us... Throughout life it often taunts us, Fate is capricious and wayward, Fate can be evil and unjust, treacherous and cruel...
"Oh, how do I know the game of Fate?"
We often call what is not up to us Fate...
But, disagreeing with these judgments, images and works like "Carmen" are born, where Freedom is above Life and Death, and Love is to the end... truly...

Natalia Osipova, Ruse 2023