PRATIQUEZ, PRATIQUEZ, PRATIQUEZ Raquel Bitton performed her solo show honoring Édith Piaf at Carnegie Hall in New York in January 2000. (And the top ticket price was $75.) Now the show, a mix of music and biographical memories, is streaming as an Actors Fund benefit.
DON’T YOU WISH YOU’D been around 21 years ago when Raquel Bitton came to Carnegie Hall? Or if you were around, aren’t you sorry you didn’t grab a ticket? And if you did, wouldn’t you love to relive that night?
Anne Powers reviewed Bitton’s show, “Édith Piaf … Her Story … Her Songs," in The New York Times and praised her craft, right down to the Piaf-perfect “sharp diction and a rousing way with a chorus.” Bitton, she wrote, ”honored Piaf’s style without strictly imitating it.”
This month the show is back, streaming for four days as an Actors Fund benefit. Bitton sings 16 Piaf numbers — including, of course, “La Vie en Rose” and “Je Ne Regrette Rien” — punctuated by commentary. In English. The performance was filmed in 2003 in Paris and at the Elgin Theater in Toronto.
O.K., it’s not exactly like a cabaret show. Bitton is accompanied by a 20-piece orchestra, not by a four- or five-person combo, but who’s complaining?
The real Piaf (in photo) was a symbol of “French patriotism, gritty urban spirit, show-biz survivalism and, most clichéd of all, romantic tragedy,” as Powers wrote in The Times. Born in 1915 in the Belleville section of Paris, she was abandoned by her mother (a cafe singer), was raised for a while by her grandmother (in a brothel!) and went traveling for a while with the circus, where her father was an acrobat.
Her musical career began with singing on the streets and was followed by fame in the large music halls of Paris in the 1930s. After years of substance abuse and personal tragedy (a lover’s death, several auto accidents), she died of liver cancer in 1963 in the south of France, near Grasse. She was 47.
The real Raquel Bitton? She was born in Morocco (Marrakesh) and moved to the United States (San Francisco) with her parents and siblings in 1970. Her father was a fan of French jazz and brought his old Piaf records to the U.S. with him.
“ÉDITH PIAF … HER STORY … HER SONGS,” presented by Broadway’s Best Shows, starring Raquel Bitton. Available for streaming Feb. 15 at 7:30 P.M. Eastern time through Feb. 18. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. Donations go to the Actors Fund. youtube.com.
View trailer here.
·
·
·
·