Giuseppe Verdi - Otello
Royal Opera House, London - 2017
Antonio Pappano, Keith Warner, Jonas Kaufmann, Maria Agresta, Marco Vratogna, Frédéric Antoun, Thomas Atkins, Kai Rüütel, Simon Shibambu, In Sung Sim, Thomas Barnard
Royal Opera House Cinema Season Live - 28 June 2017
Keith Warner nails his colours firmly to the mast at the start of the Royal Opera House's new production of Otello when Iago steps to the front of the stage before the storm explodes, holding a black mask of evil and a white mask of goodness, contemptuously discarding the white mask with an evil laugh; it's clear that this is going to be a 'black' Otello. That's as broad as the characterisation gets in Warner's abstract, incoherent and somewhat brutish production which rather stifles but doesn't entirely submerge the potential that lies elsewhere in the casting and performances.
Dividing along the lines of black and white is also as close as the production gets to making any kind of comment on the question of the Moor's ethnicity which ought to play at least a small part in how the drama unfolds. Despite persistent complaints and controversy about blacking-up in relation to this opera, race is rarely highlighted in Othello or Otello as the primary motivation behind Iago's ambition to utterly break the Moor, so although Jonas Kaufmann plays Othello with nothing more than a good tan, his fitness for the role is best judged by his vocal ability, and there can be little dispute about the quality of that.
His ability to sing the role - an immensely challenging role that I've rarely heard sung entirely successfully - is demonstrated brilliantly here, Kaufmann launching himself at those hugely expressive declarations like his life depends on it, with extraordinary control, volume and a rich timbre that prevents it from sounding like unseemly bellowing (although how long he can keep it at that level must surely be a concern). Unfortunately, as far as this production is concerned, Keith Warner doesn't appear to have given Kaufmann any real nuance or motivation in his direction and the expressionistic set designs don't offer much in the way of context either other than reflecting Othello's madness, and after a while you just feel bombarded by the lack of colouration on every front.
The set is minimal-abstract, resembling the physical location of the castle in Cyprus as well as the tower of Othello's personality that fractures and comes crashing down at the end. As the assistant director revealed in a pre-screening interview, that's illustrated mainly by shifting the walls around, opening up and closing down, with some random colouration that bears little relation to any kind of conventional colour coding or appropriateness to the drama. Act I is mainly black and masculine, with the sailors and troops in period-like costumes of leather bodices. Act II uses a plain white background that might suffice for Othello and Desdemona's love duet, but the brush strokes are too broad and it scarcely offers any nuance of Iago's underlying plotting and manipulation elsewhere.
There is a noticeable shift away from the clash of harsh realism with clear black and white moral lines in the second half of the production, but it's not any more 'illuminating', only further adding confusion as to how we ought to feel about the characters. Desdemona and a Herald arise out of gaps in the stage like apparitions in Act III as Othello's mind struggles to retain a grasp on reality, and there's a red wash of rage when the Venice delegation arrives symbolically dragging a huge statue of 'The Lion of Venice' which is seen overturned and broken in two at the end of the Act. Act IV, by way of contrast, gives prominence to the purity of Desdemona's enclosed white bedroom, but even Othello's harsh, rugged edges have softened here in a way that scarcely matches the psychological implications of what is played out there.
You certainly can't accuse Antonio Pappano of hedging his bets or any lack of coherence in his approach to Verdi's score. It's a thunderous account that sides entirely with Jonas Kaufmann's unrestrained full-force expression. I think I would prefer a little more light and shade in Otello, but there's no question that the more muscular approach is merited by the main thrust of the intense drama. It's all blood and thunder on the surface, but beneath that lies the seething web of Iago's manipulations of Cassio and Roderigo and his dedication towards anarchy and nihilism. In the context of this rather more heavy-handed approach, Marco Vratogna has no option but to settle for evil villain characterisation, which to be fair he does reasonably well.
If there is one aspect of the production worthy of unqualified praise (apart from a degree of respect for the laundry-person who has to get the stage-blood that spurts effusively from Othello's chest out of the white bed linen here) it's how it renews admiration for Verdi's score and astonishment at how successfully the composer directs everything towards the extraordinary last act of Otello in such a way the one anticipates it almost with a sense of terror. Maria Agresta ensures however that Desdemona's humanity shines brightly in contrast to the blackness laid on thickly elsewhere, her singing of the Willow Song and Ave Maria exemplary where it most needs to be. If the production lacked coherence and direction elsewhere that would draw the audience into the tragedy of the drama, the breathtaking conclusion to Act IV redeems it, if not quite justifies everything that comes before it.
Links: Royal Opera House, ROH Cinema Season
Giacomo Puccini - Tosca
OsterFestspiele, Baden-Baden - 2017
Simon Rattle, Philipp Himmelmann, Kristine Opolais, Marcelo Álvarez, Marco Vratogna, Peter Rose, Alexander Tsymbalyuk, Peter Tantsits, Douglas Williams, Walter Fink
ARTE Concert - 17th April 2017
It's too easy to write Tosca off as either a tawdry thriller or as a pure romantic melodrama. Those aspects are central to Puccini's verismo adaptation of Sardou's drama, but that doesn't necessarily mean that the characters have to be one-dimensional. There can be a little more nuance to how each of the three principal protagonists meet their fate in three of the most dramatic deaths in all opera, and a lot more to Puccini's dramatic music than heavy-handed underscoring. The Baden-Baden 2017 Easter Festival production of Tosca attempts to draw this out in Philipp Himmelmann's updating, while Simon Rattle and the Berlin Philharmonic make a strong case for the musical qualities of the work.
The conventional view of Tosca is a fairly black and white one of good guys and bad guys. On one side we have Scarpia as evil personified, twisted by the power that gives him freedom to indulge his lusts and baser instincts. On the other side we have the painter Cavaradossi as a brave rebel who stands up to arrest and torture by refusing to betray Angelotti, a colleague who has escaped from prison and hidden in the chapel where the painter is finishing a portrait of the Madonna (a very saintly enterprise). It's Tosca who takes Scarpia on directly, turning his lusts against him to buy time and escape.
All the main characters are however eventually doomed in their enterprises and it's not just cruel twists of fate; they can be seen in no small part to be the agents of their own destruction. For Tosca, it is jealousy that leads Scarpia's men to Cavaradossi's house. For Cavaradossi, it's a foolhardy embarking on revolutionary activism from what seems to be a matter of honour than for any real political conviction. Scarpia; well, his flaws are clear enough but his actions are twisted into some kind of delusional invulnerability conferred upon him by his religious devotion. In some ways, all of then can be seen to regard their fame and celebrity rendering them immune from any real harm.
As an opera, Tosca certainly merits more however than just playing to the stereotypes of sneering villainy and noble self-sacrifice. Those elements are an enjoyable element that are a necessary part of the character of the work, but there are other considerations that can provide a rather more thoughtful drama. The Baden-Baden production chooses to dispense with the Napoleonic flavour of the work for a more modern perspective, but it doesn't want to boil the baby in the reheated bathwater, to somewhat mangle a metaphor and likewise risk missing its intent.
Act I of the Baden-Baden Tosca takes place in a bright and airy cathedral, not at all like the dark ornate enclosures we are accustomed to seeing. There's space here for Cavaradossi to set up his computer and project the image he is working on onto a larger canvas. Tosca is dressed in a much more stylish bright red trouser suit and Scarpia, wearing a suit with his blond hair tied back in a ponytail, arrives with the finger-snapping efficiency of a business executive or politician with his underlings. Act II also presents a refreshingly modern outlook that gets rid of all the heavy drapes and candlesticks of a Napoleonic chamber.
There's no point in modernising Tosca however unless you can find a way to capture the same sense of menace and oppression that is in the original setting and Philipp Himmelmann finds a modern equivalence in the surveillance society of an authoritarian power. Scarpia's office is a wall of screens that are used to monitor and control the behaviour of its citizens. There is even a camera used to record his interrogations and, in an extra-creepy way, his seductions of women like Tosca that he can use to exert further influence and control over them. It's an effective enough modern context for how power is used and abused that doesn't in any way lessen the impact of the original.
Whether the singing meets similar expectations that an audience demand is another question, but again comparisons have little relevance. Everyone has their own favourite performances of past Toscas, and the cast here are unlikely to challenge any historic greats, but then opera is not a singing competition. That said, the performances are all good, and certainly effective in bringing a degree of characterisation and personality to the roles, as well as making sure that it serves to bring about the necessary impact.
Marcelo Álvarez gives the most assured performance as Cavaradossi. There's never been much doubt about his ability to sing this role before, even if he is inclined towards standing and delivering old-fashioned operatic arm-spreading gestures out to the audience. Here he is better directed and proves to be a much more competent actor: and it makes all the difference. It's a performance of intense feeling that has all the drama heroics you might like, while also singing the role exceptionally well.
Kristine Opolais may not have the commanding presence of some of the more notable Toscas in the history of opera, but by the same token she doesn't rely on the mannerisms of old. If she initially shows a few areas of weakness, they are scarcely worth drawing attention to and she gives a fine performance that grows in confidence as the drama progresses and her own character grows in response to the situations. There is no question that she hits every one of those key moments effectively and nails her 'Vissi d'arte'. Opolais also establishes an intense struggle of wills against Marco Vratogna's Scarpia in the second Act, where again the direction helps bring out Scarpia's calculating menace.
As is often the case now, Act III plays out with Cavaradossi being under no illusions about his fate, taking a more realistic view in spite of Tosca's protestations that she has their rescue all figured out. The use of lethal injections to the head instead of a firing squad deprives the audience of the traditional dramatic conclusion and from Tosca's famous leap from Castel Sant' Angelo, which is always a risky thing to do. Tosca's final cries however never fail to hit their mark, and with Simon Rattle harnessing the full power of the Berlin Philharmonic, the vital impact isn't lessened in the slightest. It all goes to show that you may get tired very easily of all the familiar imagery and costume drama, but Puccini's Tosca is bigger than that and the efficacy of its drama endures.
Links: Baden-Baden, ARTE Concert
Giuseppe Verdi - Un Ballo in Maschera
Teatro Real, Madrid, 2008
Jesús López Cobos, Mario Martone, Marcelo Álvarez, Violeta Urmana, Marco Vratogna, Elena Zaremba, Allessandra Marianelli
Opus Arte
I’m always surprised that the likes of Un Ballo in Maschera (A Masked Ball), Stiffelio, Oberto
and some other early to mid-period Verdi operas, are not better known
and more frequently performed. They certainly have the right balance and
full complement of revolutionary plots, illicit liaisons, dire threats
of revenge (what’s a Verdi opera without an exclamation of “Vendetta!”
somewhere in it?), rousing choruses and good old-fashioned belt-em-out
crowd-pleasing melodies and arias. What they lack in sophistication –
certainly when compared to later Verdi – they make up for in the pure
thrills, sensation and entertainment that are the principal reasons why
Verdi’s most famous operas (La Traviata, Aida, Rigoletto) remain popular favourites.
Even though it isn't actually an early Verdi opera, Un Ballo in Maschera (“A
Melodrama in 3 Acts”) has all the above criteria in spades. It’s far
from sophisticated, it has a revolutionary plot combined with an illicit
romantic love and doomed relationships and it has some terrific singing
roles for the performers to show their range. It’s the kind of
storyline that is laughably ridiculous and wouldn’t work convincingly
anywhere outside of an opera stage. But it is an opera, and if it works
there (although not everyone will think it does) it’s because Verdi’s
propulsive score carries you through the weaknesses with such memorable
tunes that you are swept along (humming to yourself) rather than trying
to assess the credibility of the drama.
Perhaps surprisingly, the plot
is at least loosely based on the real-life assassination of King Gustav
III of Sweden, the libretto written by Antonio Somma, based on a work by
Eugène Scribe. Un Ballo in Maschera was indeed originally composed as Gustavo III, but the opera was banned by the authorities while it was in rehearsals in Naples in 1858 after
the attempted assassination of Napoleon III , as the opera contained a
conspiracy plot. The opera was reworked for Rome with the setting
changed to America where Riccardo, the Earl of Warwick, is the English
governor of Boston, Massachusetts. His rule is not universally accepted
and there is consequently plots brewing for deaths that have occurred
under his governance, but Riccardo refuses to let such rumours restrict
his movements or his social gatherings. When papers are delivered to him
to have a fortune-teller Ulrica banished from the state, Riccardo, out
of curiosity, dons a disguise and takes his guests to see her. She also
foresees death for Riccardo, and at the hands of a close friend.
You don’t need to be a
fortune-teller however, just a familiarity with Verdi operas, to guess
that his death will come to pass at the hands of his secretary and best
friend Renato, since Riccardo has been seeing Renato’s wife, Amelia in
secret. That familiarity with opera conventions will also serve you well
as far as swallowing other expositional elements of the plot and the
dialogue. “Heavens, my husband!”, exclaims Amelia, when the two
secret lovers are in danger of being discovered, and when Renato does
start plotting with the conspirators to carry out the deed (“Vendetta!”)
at the convenient occasion of a masked ball, the skulk around
whispering a secret password so that they can recognise one another. The
secret password? “Death!”, of course.
Un Ballo in Maschera is
consequently not the kind of opera for modern updating or
interpretation, it’s firmly tied into the opera tradition of the period,
and accordingly, this production from the Teatro Real in Madrid is a
very conservative affair, a period production with stand-and-deliver
performances in the Grand Opera tradition. It’s hard to put any real
dramatic feeling behind this kind of a plot, what it really needs is a
strong bravura performance to carry it through, and that’s what you get
with Marcelo Álvarez as Riccardo. There’s no real acting ability here,
Álvarez conveying everything by striking standard opera poses with his
arms, but the Madrid audience just laps it up. The other singers
similarly fit into this old-fashioned style, delivering a by-the-book
production that alone would be good enough, but it helps when the
performances are committed and that’s certainly the case here.
This 2008 production at the
Teatro Real looks rather dark, which leads to strong contrasts in the
Blu-ray HD presentation, but the image is sharp and deeply saturated.
The audio tracks – LPCM Stereo and HD Master Audio 5.1 – are both superb
in their clarity and dynamic range. Other than a Synopsis and Cast,
there are no extra features on the BD.
