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Independent, Mar. 2, 2020 |
Michael Church |
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Beethoven: Fidelio, Royal Opera House London, ab 1. März 2020 |
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Fidelio, Royal Opera House, review: As they say in football, it’s a game of two halves
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This new production of Beethoven’s only opera, conducted by Antonio Pappano,
goes downhill after Act Two
On paper. director Tobias Kratzer,
rationale for his production of Beethoven, Mello made persuasive sense. He
start. from the premise that Beethoven set his story in Spain because the
censors would have spiked it if he, set it where it belonged. in
Revolutionary France: Kratzer, production is accordingly placed in the last
days of the Terror of 1794. There would be updating, but not in the first
act. which would take place under the banner of the Tricolour symbolising
the people, hopes. Pizarro - the evil governor - would be a Robespierre
figure: his opponent Florestan would be a Danton.
Act Two would. on
the other hand, have a Brechtian timelessness. allowing Beethoven, ideas of
political freedom to take flight. Heroine Leonore, example would be a call
for public altruism; the passive reactions to the drama by the chorus.
symbolising us. would be shown projected onto the backdrop. The merciful
deus ex machina at the end would not be played by a higher state authority,
but collectirly by the chorus self.
The dialogue at the liberating
close would include quotes from the playwrights Georg Buchner and Franz
Grillparzer, both near-contemporaries of Beethoven. It all sounded very
neat.
We are warned before the curtain rises that Jonas Kaufmann -
whose presence as the embattled hero Florestan packed the house months ago
is under the weather and craves our indulgence, but as he dcesn't appear in
the first act, and as his part in the second is a small one, that's no great
problem. Excellently sung and acted, and presented in period costume with
painterly chiaroscuro sets by Rainer Sellmaier, the act establishes a
suitably dark and melodramatic world. The sub-plot is finely sung by Amanda
Forsythe and Robin llitschler as the ill-assorted couple Marzelline and
laquino: Georg Zeppenfeld. as Rocco. makes a bombastic but benign gaoler; as
-Fidel.- - Leonore disguised as a man - the Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen
sings with the serene power and authority we have come to expect of her. The
great Quartet, in which the four main characters sing in perfect harmony
while their individual lines are at furious cross-purposes, is, as it should
be, the musical high point. Meanwhile, the prisoners' hesitant emergence
into the sunlight is beautifully done. There is one mysterious directorial
insertion into the plot, when Marzelline is allowed to observe (and react
hysterically to) Leonore's revelatory disrobing, thus being made privy to
her secret: this sabotages Leonore's most beautiful aria.
Then,
alas. comes Act Tivo, in which things fall apart. Florestan, supposedly in
his subterranean dungeon, becomes a ragged figure tethered on top of a mound
of mud. and is surrounded by a dark-suited crowd seated in a semi-circle as
in a closed-sect prayer-meeting; above them is a giant screen on which their
faces remain projected throughout the act. The most important moment in
Kaufman. role is his cry - on one single long-drawn-out note at the outset -
followed by a few anguished lines about the hopelessness of his plight. This
should be a great dramatic moment, but Kaufmann - -presumably egged on
by Kratzer - turns it into a "performance" that is irritatingly
self-regarding rather than honestly dramatic. Then Rocco and Leonore start
to dig half-heartedly, singing of the person supposedly in a dungeon below,
while that person is actually lying prone beside them. Nothing adds up; all
the elements of the staging -some naturalistic, others stylised - are at
odds with each other.
And so on, and so on, until we come to the
expected sanguinary climax where Pizarro's knife is held to Florestan's
throat. About to strike, he is felled by a perfectly-synchronised pistol
shot - Barn! - from a now-radicalised Marzelline who appears in a doorway,
just by chance in the nick of time. I'm sure we're not supposed to laugh,
but we do. Thereafter it's all downhill, with poor Davidsen having to
struggle out of her trousers while attempting to join in the ecstatic
closing chorus. As they say in football, it's a game of two halves.
Davidsen's applause brings the house down, Kaufmann's is tepid, Kratzer's is
best described as an expression of extremely modified rapture.
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