Reviews 2002
Reviews 2002
✭✭✭✭✩
by George Frideric Handel, directed by Tom Diamond
Canadian Opera Company, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto
April 6-21, 2002
"Come, See, Be Conquered"
Of Handel’s forty extant operas “Julius Caesar” (“Giulio Cesare in Egitto”) is the greatest and most popular. The score is such an embarrassment of riches, one is hard pressed to choose a favourite aria, whether from the beautiful laments or the spectacular showpieces, since each highlights so well the features of the voice it was written for. For this production COC General Director Richard Bradshaw has assembled a stellar cast who make the evening a delight from beginning to end.
The story of the 1724 opera is a revised version of the libretto Antonio Sartorio set for his similarly titled opera of 1676. Last December the COC Ensemble presented this work in what may have been its first performance since the 17th century. Such are the similarities of plot that those lucky enough to have seen the Sartorio will find little need of surtitles during the Handel. Besides, Handel’s librettist Nicola Haym, has streamlined the work, removing the comic characters and situations, giving the remaining characters greater depth and cutting away an undergrowth of subplots to make the central conflicts clearer.
Handel’s Julius Caesar, newly landed in Egypt, finds himself in the midst of a power struggle between sibling co-rulers Tolomeo and Cleopatra. Brother and sister plot to win Caesar to their respective sides, he through violence, she through sex. The actions of both have unforeseen consequences. Tolomeo sends Caesar the head of Caesar’s enemy Pompey, but rather than winning Caesar’s favour Caesar abhors the deed and the doer and Pompey’s widow Cornelia and her son Sesto vow vengeance. Cleopatra gives mother and son access to the palace but the two are soon captured and imprisoned, further increasing Caesar enmity towards Tolomeo. As in Sartorio, Cleopatra disguises herself as the servant “Lydia” to use her wiles to win Caesar over. However, unlike Sartorio’s, Handel’s libretto places greater emphasis on the transformation within Cleopatra: what was merely deception on her part turns into true love. Sartorio’s work explicitly presents the players as subject to the whims of Fortune and Love. In contrast, Handel’s shows how greatness of character, seen in Caesar, Cleopatra, Cornelia and Sesto, triumphs over adversity.
The production boasts an outstanding cast, only two of the eight roles taken by non-Canadians. In Handel’s day the three leading male roles would have been played by castrati. This production features countertenors in the roles of Tolomeo and Sesto and the incomparable Polish mezzo Ewa Podleś as Caesar. Just as Toronto audiences still praise Lotfi Mansouri for bringing Joan Sutherland to the COC, they will praise Richard Bradshaw for engaging Ewa Podleś. The demanding role allows Podleś to showcase her amazing three-octave range and negotiate Handel’s vocal gymnastics with breath-taking aplomb. Bravos rang out after every one of her arias. The chocolaty timbre of her voice is addictive and the joy she clearly takes in singing the role instantly communicates itself to the audience. Her aria with horns “Va tacito” is particularly infectious and the ease with which she tossed off the Niagara of runs in “Quel torrente” is astounding.
To see Podleś as Caesar would be reason enough to see the production. But the gauntlet of virtuosity that she threw down was picked up triumphantly by Canadian soprano Isabel Bayrakdarian as Cleopatra. While Caesar’s wide range of emotion are always cast within an heroic framework, Cleopatra is the character who undergoes the greatest change. Though this is her first assumption of the role, Bayrakdarian is completely at home in it. In a stunning scene at the end of Act 2 Bayrakdarian shows the girlish intriguer metamorphose into a lamenting woman in love right before our eyes. Her ravishing account of “Piangerò” at the end of Act 2 held the audience spellbound.
The production marked the COC debut of Canadian countertenor Daniel Taylor in the castrato role of Tolomeo. The richness of his voice has become well-known through recordings and recitals. The surprise in seeing him on stage is the intensity of his acting. He makes Tolomeo into a sadistic psychopath, the unearthly voice seeming a natural intimation of madness only emphasized by occasional descents for effect into his baritone range as in his terrifying “Domerò” of Act 3.
These three performances amaze, but in truth there is no weak link in the cast. Quebecoise contralto Marie-Nicole Lemieux’s rich, pure-toned voice lends Cornelia a seriousness and depth of emotion that overcome the production’s stereotyping of her character. Well-known American countertenor Brian Asawa has played Tolomeo in other productions, but here is well-suited to the role of Sesto, his high clear tone perfect for Cornelia’s young son. Olivier Laquerre as Achilla, Tolomeo’s general in love with Cornelia, and Andrea Ludwig as Nireno, Cleopatra’s servant, play the same parts they did in Sartorio’s opera. Along with Bruce Schaef as Curio, they sing and act with distinction.
For this production the pit has been raised so that the smaller orchestra will be better heard. Under the expert guidance of conductor Kenneth Montgomery, they play with such lightness and clarity of texture one would think they were a band of original instruments.
The music-making in this “Julius Caesar” is of such a high order that the enterprise would succeed without sets or costumes. Those borrowed from the Florida Grand Opera did not undermine one’s enjoyment but they did didn’t add much either. Paul Steinberg’s set featuring miniature pyramids and temples in primary colours and hieroglyphics turned to scribbles, seem to cast Egypt as a giant playground. This is not so distracting in the first act focussing on the power games afoot in Egypt, but as the characters grow in stature the concept’s jokiness is a poor background for the grandeur of the music and the emotions expressed. Likewise Constance Hoffman’s costumes which rummage through various periods and styles suggest an “anime” version of the ancient world. Particularly dislikable is costuming Cornelia as a Victorian matron complete with bustle forcing the character literally and figuratively into too narrow an interpretation. If the sets and costumes were good for anything it was in providing surfaces for Kevin Adams’s imaginative lighting. His ability to produce contrasting planes of vivid colours while emphasizing the long shadows cast by the players more than any physical element set the appropriate mood for each scene.
Working with a borrowed production is always difficult, but director Tom Diamond blocks the action as if it had been his own, bringing contemporary notions to bear in Tolomeo’s frightening mental state, Cleopatra’s flirtatiousness and the depiction of Tolomeo’s henchmen as secret agents. Unlike the sets and costumes, Diamond’s direction never compromises the opera seria’s seriousness of purpose. Choreographer Serge Bennethan’s corps of seven males dancers populate the vast spaces of Egypt with sinuous figures, powerful in the battle between Tolomeo and Caesar, while elsewhere their spiralling gestures seem a modern reflection of Handel’s ornamentation.
At the end you feel this beautiful work could not be better cast or better sung. This is only the second opera by Handel the COC has ever produced. We’re ready for more.
©Christopher Hoile
Note: This review is a Stage Door exclusive.
Photo: Isabel Bayrakdarian and Ewa Podleś. ©2002 Michael Cooper.
2002-04-10
Giulio Cesare