By James Jorden
One thing you can’t call David McVicar is inept. His productions always work with precision, every movement landing everyone in the right place at the right time, every “still” moment photo-ready. Reportedly he brings shows in on budget and on time, and there’s never a last-minute scramble to improvise some kind of action for the fourth act. (more…)
By James Jorden
The Metropolitan Opera debut of Donizetti’s Anna Bolena, an amazing 180 years into the work’s history, won mostly respectful reviews last week—in between snipes at Anna Netrebko’s momentary breaking of character during the “Tower Scene.” A common thread in both published and popular opinion, though, was that the piece itself was not very interesting, at least absent a Maria Callas or Edita Gruberova to kick a little life into it. It’s hard to argue with taste, but possible, I think, to propose that the perceived longueurs of the opera are not integral to the work but rather a function of the way it was presented. (more…)
By James Jorden
When stage directors decide to intervene (as opposed to merely curating) there are a number of approaches they can take: deconstruction, gloss on the text, invention of an entirely new narrative. Or they can take the somewhat safer route of changing the epoch of the action, setting La bohème during World War I, or in the 1950s, or even the present.
Now, in general, I’m not a fan of strict (i.e., realistic) updating, for a couple of reasons. For one, there are changes in technology and in society in general that have to be taken into account. An opera whose plot relies upon the urgent exchange of letters (e.g, Werther) tends to fall apart if the audience is given a chance to wonder why nobody just picks up the phone. (more…)