Eroica (2003 TV movie)

[Phil Leeds]

Oh Yes, I remember the "HORNS" bit. Also thought the bit when the footman is talking to Ries is funny, the footman says something like "He's really b*ggered about with it ... if it was Haydn it would be all done by now"

[Michael]

Oh Yes, I remember the "HORNS" bit. Also thought the bit when the footman is talking to Ries is funny, the footman says something like "He's really b*ggered about with it ... if it was Haydn it would be all done by now"

The footman who delivers that line was played by Robert Glenister, who played Beethoven in a BBC radio play which was broadcast around the same time as "Eroica". (Maybe a year earlier).

[PDG]

OK, Preston, no counter comments from me at this point.
The portrayal of Haydn (as Chris pointed out) I thought was magisterial, and I have to confess one line brought me tears (not for its historical veracity, which is unsubstantiated, but more for its delivery) :
"Everything is different from today".

"From today, everything is different."

[PDG]

I remember him best from Bouquet of Barbed Wire (mid-'70s TV).

[Michael]

I remember him best from Bouquet of Barbed Wire (mid-'70s TV).

I remember him playing Van Helsing in a very good 1979 miniseries called (what else) "Count Dracula".
When playing Haydn, he should have reacted when the last movement of the "Eroica" started revealing the "Prometheus" theme because it would have been equivalent to hearing a pop song in the middle of a cantata. That tune was really well-known in Vienna at the time because the ballet from which it came was a great success. I think the piano variations were out and about for a good while, too.
(Just an obscure point that the scriptwriter couldn't have known or bothered about - and maybe the camera was off him when he jumped!)

[Peter]

There is another Eroica Austrian film dating from 1949 directed by Walter Kolm-Veltée which has a good review on imdb - has anyone seen it?

[PDG]

When playing Haydn, he should have reacted when the last movement of the "Eroica" started revealing the "Prometheus" theme because it would have been equivalent to hearing a pop song in the middle of a cantata. That tune was really well-known in Vienna at the time because the ballet from which it came was a great success. I think the piano variations were out and about for a good while, too.

Are you sure, Michael? I thought the ballet was a relative failure, commercially and critically? I remember reading that the music was "too learned for the art form" or something. I suppose there are similarities with Fidelio in this regard. Just the one completed work in the genre, and brilliant, yet curiously unappreciated and unsatisfying at the time...

On the Prometheus theme point (in the film), the whole room would have been restless and muttering I think, not just Papa Finlay!...

[Michael]

Are you sure, Michael? I thought the ballet was a relative failure, commercially and critically? I remember reading that the music was "too learned for the art form" or something. I suppose there are similarities with Fidelio in this regard. Just the one completed work in the genre, and brilliant, yet curiously unappreciated and unsatisfying at the time...

On the Prometheus theme point (in the film), the whole room would have been restless and muttering I think, not just Papa Finlay!...

Well, according to Barry Cooper, the ballet was a great success despite the initial review. It was performed fourteen times in 1801 and nine times the following year. "All the musical cognoscenti in Vienna therefore had ample opportunity to hear it. Beethoven rapidly made a piano arrangement of the entire ballet, and this was rushed into print by Artaria, appearing less than three months after the premiere. It was also released on DVD a month later."
(The last sentence might not strictly be true but the rest is quoted from Cooper's book).

Very good point about everybody in the room recognising it.

[Michael]

There is another Eroica Austrian film dating from 1949 directed by Walter Kolm-Veltée which has a good review on imdb - has anyone seen it?

I have a feeling that extracts from this movie were used in the documentary "Beethoven's Hair" which was broadcast a few years ago, following the publication of the book. But I may be wrong.

[Roehre]

Well, according to Barry Cooper, the ballet was a great success despite the initial review. It was performed fourteen times in 1801 and nine times the following year. "All the musical cognoscenti in Vienna therefore had ample opportunity to hear it. Beethoven rapidly made a piano arrangement of the entire ballet, and this was rushed into print by Artaria, appearing less than three months after the premiere.

This piano reduction was published as opus 24, the variations got opus 35 (both Beethoven's assignments), the orchestral score of the ballet has got no.43, the Contretänze WoO 14 did not have an opus number as they were considered to be too unimportant, though money spinners!

Because of the publication of the orchestral score as opus 43 some confusion started. Was it the same work? Yes, it was.

Beethoven originally planned to publish the two violin sonatas in a-minor and F-major ("Spring") as opus 23 no.1 and 23 no.2 respectively. These two sonatas were unfortunately published in two different formats, one in landscape, one in portrait (in now-adays' terms). A solution had to be found: it was simple a matter of leaving the ballet as opus 43, and use the opus number 24 for the spring sonata.

The fact that the ballet got opus 43 therefore does not mean that the variations opus 35 were the first to be published. And the nickname "Eroica-variations" is not Beethoven's either.

But back to the Eroica film.
IMO one of the better Beethoven films, perhaps matched by the BBC three parter on the composer from 2005.

[Michael]

But back to the Eroica film.
IMO one of the better Beethoven films, perhaps matched by the BBC three parter on the composer from 2005.

Yes, that BBC three-parter really got it right, in my humble.