Past Production Reviews
14This weekend I saw the ENO’s production of Nico Muhly’s Marnie. Based on a novel by Winston Graham which later became a Hitchcock film, the story is full of suspense and drama. Visually beautiful and very cleverly staged, using moving set pieces and projections to provide film-like transitions between scenes, the production was rich to look at, full of eye-catching tableaus and scenes. The costuming was very effective as well, particularly on Marnie herself and her quartet of Shadow Marnies who followed her throughout the show.
La version lyrique de Nico Muhly, coproduction entre l’English National Opera et le Metropolitan Opera de New York, est plus compatissante envers Marnie que le film, et se rapproche davantage du livre original. La voleuse est ici victime, et affirme que nous, êtres humains, incarnons constamment des personnages distincts selon notre environnement. La mise en scène entoure donc la protagoniste de quatre « ombres » (Charlotte Beament, Katie Coventry, Emma Kerr and Katie Stevenson), qui révèlent plusieurs facettes de sa personnalité. Quatre danseurs en costumes de bureau apparaissent à intervalles réguliers dans des chorégraphies très saccadées, pour représenter l’emprise masculine et les forces qui se jouent contre elle. Au cours d’une croisière, ils se placent autour de son lit et rappellent les « hommes aux costumes gris » dont la Princesse Diana parlait régulièrement.
The universality of its central themes of love and loss are easy enough to relate to; the Artistic Director of the ENO, Daniel Kramer, credits La Bohème’s prevailing popularity with the decision to restage its “near-perfect equilibrium between realism and romanticism, comedy and pathos, at whose heart lies the relationship between the forlorn couple of Rodolfo and Mimi”.https://www.ayoungertheatre.com/review-la-boheme-london-coliseum-3/
First seen in 2009, Miller’s Bohème nudges the action forward some 100 years to the ‘années folles’ of the 1920s. Café Momus becomes an edgy guinguette where Fitzgerald and André Breton might have traded writing tips with Rodolfo, and a Josephine Baker-esque Musetta (Nadine Benjamin) holds the stage. It’s a neat sleight-of-hand, nicely framed in Isabella Bywater’s revolving sets — an unobtrusive restoring of operatic order after Benedict Andrews’s teenage rebellion of a crack-den Bohème for ENO in 2015.
Le chœur d’adultes et d’enfants de l’English National Opera se réunit, soudé, entraînant et solidaire sur scène. Le résultat vocal est joyeux et rassurant. Enfin, l’orchestre symphonique, dirigé par la cheffe italienne Valentina Peleggi, dynamise et propulse dans la musique de Bizet dès l'ouverture brillante, à travers ce sombre et cruel road-tripe espagnol.
Driving the drama is ENO Mackerras Fellow Valentina Peleggi. Her conducting is dynamic yet detailed; rarely if ever at ENO have the lines of the orchestral contribution been so finely honed, and the orchestra clearly loves her, on top form throughout. Chiselled rhythms, a full realisation of the colourful orchestration, a deep grasp of the ongoing dramatic thrust were all in evidence, as was a willingness to relax into the lyricism where appropriate (as in the José/Micaëla passages in the first act around what in French would have been ‘Parle-moi de ma mère’); and now the run has settled in, ensemble problems were minimal. The wonderfully reedy bassoon at the beginning of the second act particularly merits mention.
The other Harewood Artists were ... and Andri Björn Róbertsson singing Theseus. All clearly have great careers ahead and gave wholehearted performances.
Andri Björn Róbertsson, Emma Carrington, Simon Butteriss, Timothy Robinson and Jonathan Lemalu who may have smaller roles, but add much character and wonderful singing and acting in the final scenes.
