Martin Winkler / Рецензии

The orchestra played at its best, with good and polished sound and with contagious enthusiasm for the first time in the season. Even if Ivor Bolton gave a vivid rendition of the score, with quick tempi and vibrant accent, he did not find the unclassifiable tone that the score requires (he cannot be too harshly blamed, though). He rightly underlined the comic traits with a joyous touch of operetta and saturating sound in the tutti, favouring volume over contrast and colour. The chorus suffered a bit from the loud pit but sounded fine in the carnival scenes.A more attractive cast would have raised the stakes of the performance, but no singer seemed willing (or able) to take the lead. Manuela Uhl is a fine singer with a powerful lyric soprano that makes her perfect for Wagner's “blonde heroines". Isabella.Christopher Maltman was brilliant as the awkward villain, Friedrich. He is a great actor and was the only one who offered an original and genuinely comic performance. Vocally, his lyric baritone lacked authority and even timbre, but he gave an overall good rendition. Bass Ante Jerkunica, an interesting voice, made the most of his funny judgement scene. Ilker Arcayürek was overwhelmed by the otherwise reasonable requirements of the beautifully written role of Claudio, and even lost his voice during the final duo with Isabella. The other tenor, of a very similar vocality, Peter Lodahl, had better fortune as Luzio.

Laughter is a powerful dramatic weapon. Not the kind of laughter you normally get in the Royal Opera House - knowing, self-conscious - but actual inelegant, snorting-before-you-even-realised-it laughter. Kosky harnesses this anarchic force, startling an audience expecting an improving piece of musical modernism by giving them instead a disarming piece of cutthroat comedy.Kosky, in a brilliant sleight of hand, transforms the oversized nose into a mischievous tap-dancing boy. Ilan Galkoff clearly has a ball, and together with his troupe of adult tap dancers (ten in total) they nearly romp off with the piece, thanks to Otto Pichler's superb choreography and the witty designs of Klaus Grunberg.A rash of false noses and some elaborate costumes make it hard to identify many of the players, but the core ensemble make their presence known, relishing the vernacular rough and tumble of David Pountney's new English translation. John Tomlinson leers and lurches and broods as (by turns) the Barber, Newspaper Office Clerk and Doctor, while the double act of Helene Schneiderman and Ailish Tynan forms a deliciously grotesque mother and daughter team. Alexander Kravets's Police Inspector finds comic gold in the composer's extraordinarily demanding vocal writing, and Susan Bickley makes much of her cameo as the Old Countess. But the evening belongs to Martin Winkler, a singing-actor of such skill, whose physical and vocal clowning as the luckless Kovalev - all orifices and ooze in Kosky's hideous portrait - must penetrate this bustling phantasmagoria and make us care. Panto season has arrived early, and for those who like their clowns sad and their comedy sharpened to a point, there won't be a better show this winter.