Michael Mofidian / Reviews

This 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.

Richard Jones’ production revived with warmth, elegance and added resonance

Café Momus on Christmas Eve is clearly suffering from a waiter shortage; fewer customers too, plus a shrunken crowd milling outside. Otherwise, there are fewer changes than you might expect in Dan Dooner’s Covid-conscious, socially distanced edition of Richard Jones’s 2017 production of Puccini’s masterpiece. The snow continues to drift from the heavens, and the bohemians’ Paris garret hasn’t got any warmer. More to the point for this story of sudden love, poverty and cruel death, the characters still intermingle, embrace, and, in the case of Musetta, bite. Meanwhile, down in the pit, an orchestra of 74 has been stripped down to 47, armed with Mario Parenti’s reduced orchestration. Yet despite much lighter forces, Puccini remains Puccini.

This production is by the Royal Opera’s Jette Parker Young Artists, a programme that supports the development of young professional artists. It’s directed by Noa Naamat and Edmund Whitehead conducts the Southbank Sinfonia. The performance opens on a dimly lit stage. The set is minimal – just two curved staircases and a rotating platform. We’re confronted with the dying Minotaur and a four-strong chorus setting the scene. The Minotaur maintains a brooding, malevolent presence throughout. Chinese mezzo-soprano Hongni Wu is excellent as Phaedra. Her darkly sensual voice is perfect for the role and her fine acting conveys the character’s rage and desire for revenge. She dominates whenever she is on stage. Wu brings power and agency to the role. Phaedra may be a pawn in Aphrodite’s scheming, but she’s no victim. This contrasts with New Zealand tenor Filipe Manu’s Hippolyt, who is touchingly innocent and somewhat at the mercy of the three women in his life. American countertenor Patrick Terry adds a welcome light touch of humour to his Artemis in Act Two’s resurrection scene.

Complementing this score, both rich and compact, is the showtime set by takis and simply glamorous costumes, sapphire blue in the first half, fiery orange in the aftermath. In the title role, as the woman taken over by an obsessive and destructive infatuation with her stepson Hippolytus is the vocally and physically agile Chinese-born mezzo- soprano Hongni Wu. The New Zealander-Tongan tenor Filipe Manu as the object of her unfortunate desires is already impressive, The Southbank Sinfonia is one of London's niftiest orchestras, and a perfect fit for this sometimes jazzy, sometimes filmic, always kaleidoscopic score, conductor Edmund Whitehead impressively spinning all these plates at once. Jette Parker Young Artist Noa Naamat has that rare quality among opera directors today: she knows that less is more, and never meddles when the music, libretto, lighting designer (Lee Curran) and artists are getting on with their job. That restraint bodes very well for the flourishing of other works on her watch. Lots to look forward to from the Jette Parker alumni, in short. Catch this remarkable work, and you will see what I mean.

You couldn’t ask for a more cultured pair of voices than our master and servant pairing of Erwin Schrott and Gerald Finley: both have burnished, smooth bass-baritone voices and effortless Mozartian phrasing which meant that, in purely musical terms, listening to them was a delight. However, Schrott’s comic timing seemed off in recitative – the little delays while he tries to remember the name of the woman he’s talking to held for slightly too long, an occasional hesitancy rather than confident gusto. In terms of comedy, Finley’s Leporello is something of a work in progress: in his role debut, the alternation of cringing and deviousness didn’t come across as natural. But these are two great singers and the chemistry between them improved through the course of this performance. Let’s hope that it keeps doing so during the run.In contrast, Adela Zaharia’s Donna Anna and Frédéric Antoun’s Don Ottavio looked completely comfortable in their roles from the moment they arrived on stage. Zaharia was the pick of the singers, with ardent delivery, clear intelligibility and a voice that made you sit up and listen. Antoun’s tenor has a slightly covered timbre but he injected plenty of emotion and played a full part in moving the action along. Nicole Chevalier (like Zaharia, a frequent star at Komische Oper Berlin) sang Donna Elvira with masses of character and total confidence throughout her range. I could have hoped for sharper comedy and some more chemistry between characters. But this is an intelligent staging, vocal performances were excellent throughout and the orchestral playing that kept us completely engaged from start to finish. Even with a half-full Covent Garden, it was good to be back.

The stage is dominated by a disorientating set of doors and panels, populated by ghostly figures, and against which are projected the names of Giovanni’s past conquests, giving an immediate sense of the appalling scale of his activities. Schrott, the only repeat singer from the previous 2019 revival, exudes the dark tone and devilish arrogance that he brought to Covent Garden as Mephistopheles in Gounod’s Faust, yet even he can disappear, wraith-like into this disturbing, hallucinatory and slightly tawdry background. While the Don’s fortunes prosper, we see the steady disintegration of his servant Leporello, brilliantly acted, wonderfully sung by Gerald Finley, coming across like a sad clown who just cannot go on any more. All the principals are high-class, with Zaharia outstanding for impressive strength throughout her range. Her top notes, sung piano in rejecting Don Ottavio’s suit, are exquisite. Markova has an incisive but ingratiating tone, and is a splendid actress, complemented by the fine bass Michael Mofidian as Masetto. Chevalier, after a less impressive start, is in commanding form later, especially in her act 2 scena and aria Mi tradi and the sweet-voiced Frederic Antoun invests the spurned Don Ottavio with a dignity not always found in the role. The orchestra brings out the colours appropriate to the action, but conductor Constantin Trinks occasionally allows its enthusiasm to get the better of the ideal balance with the singers.