Faust (opera) - in Other Art Forms

In Other Art Forms

Parts of the opera have seeped into popular culture in Europe over more than a century. It was so popular in the United States that in New York the opera season began with a performance of it every year for several decades in the late nineteenth century, a fact to which Edith Wharton makes great reference in her novel The Age of Innocence. The Argentinian author Estanislao del Campo wrote a satirical poem, Fausto (1866), which describes a gaucho's impressions during the performance of Gounod's opera.

A performance of the opera is part of the story of Gaston Leroux's The Phantom of the Opera and features in some film adaptations including the 1925 version. Irene Dunne performs the "Jewel Song" in the film Stingaree (1934) and Jeanette MacDonald performs several scenes from the opera in San Francisco (1936), complete with costumes, sets and orchestra.

There are very short extracts from the words to the "Jewel Song" in several stories in The Adventures of Tintin. In this series of comic strips, Tintin and his sidekick, Captain Haddock, often encounter a bombastic opera singer called Bianca Castafiore, of a more than passing resemblance to a later (1882) eminent Marguerite, Emma Calvé. Her trademark is the jewel song, which she always sings at high volume, never saying more than Ah! je ris de me voir si belle en ce miroir or a few words more from other lines. The entire Tintin story The Castafiore Emerald (original title: La Castafiore's Jewels) derives from this running gag.

Although the Walpurgisnacht ballet sequence from act 5 is often omitted from staged opera performances, it is frequently performed separately as part of a ballet program, e.g. George Balanchine's Walpurgisnacht Ballet.

Siébel's aria, "Faites-lui mes aveux" from act 3 of the opera is quoted twice ("Tell her, oh flower") by Dorn in act 2 of Chekhov's play, The Seagull. The same song is used as the basis for Ravel's piano piece À la manière de Chabrier, in which the song by Gounod is rendered in the style of a composer much admired by Ravel.