Frühere Produktionsrezensionen
7This opera and Warner’s production show very clearly Otello’s descent into jealous madness, contrasted with the jubilant scenes at the start, where the wonderful movement among the actors forms a prelude to his victorious arrival after defeating the Saracens in the eastern Mediterranean.
Keith Warner’s 2017 production at London’s Royal Opera House, now revived, takes us beyond these shores into the darkest corners of Otello’s tower. Gregory Kunde sings the titular role of Otello. He steps into Jonas Kaufmann’s shoes. No easy task. But Kunde has become a familiar face at the ROH, performing three times in as many years since his 2016 debut. And he can clearly hold his own.
He was widely admired as the grand old man of Italian opera but had not produced a new work since Aida some 15 years earlier. Yet Otello features some of his most powerful music, bursting with impressive originality and energy. With a very strong cast and Antonio Pappano conducting, Covent Garden does glorious justice to this fine work.
It’s good to have expectations confounded. For much of his career, American tenor Gregory Kunde specialised in bel canto repertoire, his light, flexible voice ideal for Rossini with easy top notes that also meant he could tackle Berlioz’ stratospheric tenor roles like Énée and Benvenuto Cellini with distinction. In recent years though, Kunde has taken an unexpected lurch into heavier repertoire. I was unconvinced by his Manrico and approached his Otello in this first revival of Keith Warner’s production at The Royal Opera with trepidation, having missed him when he played second fiddle to Jonas Kaufmann in 2017.
Graeme Broadbent steals the show as the cynical Satyr who advises the men that marriage will be merely trouble and strife, he projects robust good humour while thrilling us with a gravelly basso profondo. Sky Ingram is a splendid Venus, a magnet for the audience’s attention. Louise Alder’s Eurydice is the pick of the singers for the sublime parts. The set of emotions she has to project isn’t exactly complex, but she puts across Eurydice’s fidelity and despair in an engaging manner, helped by a sweet voice, spot-on intonation and well-turned phrasing.In view of Mary Bevan having a throat infection, the title role was sung by Siobhan Stagg with Bevan acting – the plan is that Stagg will act the role also from the third performance until Bevan’s return. Obviously, having to split the role isn’t ideal, but Bevan put in a sterling effort at mime and Stagg showed that she certainly has the voice for the role. Some of the theatrical tricks worked well. Venus’s transformation into the old crone Alkippe is masterly, and the appearance of the Three Graces in Act II (I won’t give the game away) comes as a real shock. I enjoyed Act III a lot more, when the frantic pace slackened off and we were treated to some truly lovely arias from Stagg’s Orpheus, Alder’s Eurydice and Caitlin Hulcup as Aristaeus - having spent most of the previous two Acts being downtrodden and risible, Hulcup seized her chance to project some real pathos. L’Ormindo, from the same period, by the same company at the same venue, was the best thing I saw last season. Orpheus doesn’t come close to that completeness, but any performance at the Sam Wanamaker is a delight and there’s plenty to enjoy in this production. And it’s worth going out of historical interest alone.
Vratogna is in total command, vocally and dramatically, ever alert to the sinuous subtleties of Verdi’s most flexible score, dark and menacing, and ruthless in his racist determination to destroy his man. He knows instinctively that all devious schemers can present a plausible face to the world while sowing seeds of doubt in malleable minds. Vratogna took over the role just three weeks ago (just as he stepped in as Scarpia three years ago) and it was he, not Kaufmann, who drew and deserved the greatest ovation on opening night.That storm scene introduces another character to the piece in this new production: the set itself. Designer Boris Kudlička has built a clever, shape-shifting tunnel that fragments and slides, lit starkly by Bruno Poet to emphasise Otello’s descent into jealous madness, or bathed in soft, golden hues when hidden rooms and courtyards are revealed behind attractive Moorish tracery. The set both brilliantly frames and comments on the drama, and is suitably ambiguous for a production that consciously moves away from the realism of Moshinsky’s Renaissance world towards an expressionism that more closely reflects Verdi’s most daringly fluid score.The Italian soprano Maria Agresta makes an implacable Desdemona, devastated yet dignified in the face of Otello’s false accusations of adultery and singing with a tender yet creamy intensity, never more so than in Piangea cantando nell’erma landa and her heartfelt Ave Maria, moments before her demise. The Canadian tenor Frédéric Antoun is a lithely elegant Cassio, and among the smaller roles, Estonian mezzo Kai Rüütel as Emilia and Korean bass In Sung Sim really make their mark.
