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by Charles Gounod, directed by Amy Lane

Canadian Opera Company, Four Seasons Centre, Toronto

September 27-October 18, 2025

Roméo: “Allons… tu ne me connais pas”

In a season where four of the six operas on offer are remounts of productions Toronto has already seen, the chance to see Roméo et Juliette was something to look forward to. The 1867 opera, Charles Gounod’s second most performed opera after Faust (1859), had not been staged by the Canadian Opera Company since 1992. Therefore, it was a bitter disappointment to find the present production borrowed from Opera Malmö to be deficient in design and direction and the casting lacking a convincing Roméo or Juliette.

In her Director’s Note, Amy Lane states that just before working on the design concept for the production, “New York immediately flashed into my mind as the ideal setting for this production—a place that would perfectly suit and complement the cinematic nature of Gounod’s heart-breaking and, ultimately, beautiful score”. We can’t help but wonder whether Lane forgot that in 1957 someone else (i.e., Leonard Bernstein) had thought of New York as the ideal setting for Shakespeare’s tragedy and had written a musical based on this idea that became world famous.

Instead of the gangs in West Side Story, Lane concocts her own story of rival families in 19th-century New York – the Capulets as an “entertainment empire” and the Montaigus involved in “the city’s banking and industrial sectors”. In Lane’s vision, the initial ball scene is “the Capulets’ glamorous, circus-themed masquerade garden party on New Year’s Eve, 1889”. The problem with Lane’s manufactured backstory is 1) that Shakespeare’s play provides no backstory and doesn’t need one, and 2) that none of Lane’s backstory appears in the production. When the opera opens, we think we are at a circus not a circus-themed party and because the only labelled tent says “ Théâtre Bizarre” we think we must be in France.

Gounod’s librettists, the prolific Jules Barbier and Michel Carré, alter Shakespeare’s play to make it suitable as an opera but do not omit any of the most essential scenes. It differs from Shakespeare in that there is no scene of reconciliation between the feuding families after the lovers die. There is no scene between Roméo and an Apothecary. Roméo’s page, Stéphano (not in Shakespeare) comes looking for Roméo and has long aria. Frère Laurent does not reveal his role in the lovers’ deaths. Pâris does not visit Juliette in her tomb and therefore is not killed by Roméo. And, most significantly, Roméo is still alive when Juliette awakes, thus allowing the pair to sing one last duet – after how could they refuse the dying lovers a last duet in an opera?

Yet, Lane adds changes of her own none of which are helpful. She has Count Capulet perform a strip tease during his aria “Allons! Jeunes gens!“. She has Roméo look on when Mercutio is killed rather than coming between Mercutio and Tybalt as is stated in Mercutio’s dying lines. She has an unknown woman in the entourage of the Duke of Verona (he is still called this though we are in New York) kill the Duke just before the curtain falls. And Lane has a troupe of dancers (Are they supposed to be ghosts?), hovering about in the family vault wearing braided military tunics, to change Juliette’s bed into an altar and then into Juliette’s bier.

Designer Emma Ryott’s sets and costumes are depressingly unattractive. At the masquerade ball in Act 1, the individualized costumes for the chorus and the eight (unnecessary) dancers provides a confusing background for the action and makes it impossible to tell Montaigus from Capulets. In Act 3 the most prominent feature of Frère Laurent’s cell is what looks like a modern medicine cabinet while Laurent is wearing a long, white coat looking more like an apothecary than a friar. In the second scene of that act, Ryott imagines a street that is as dull as the ball scene was overdone. It includes a projecting modern metal platform which cannot be a fire escape since that is where the Duke of Verona enters and where Roméo stands when he should be on the street.

The greatest flaw of Ryott’s design is that it requires pauses between scenes in an act for set changes. These pauses ruin the pace of the action and, given the results of the set change, look unnecessary. Lane has the “ghosts” change Juliette’s bed into an altar without a pause. Why does she need a pause when they change the altar into a bier?

One might be able to suffer the unhelpful direction and design if the singing were outstanding, but, unfortunately, it is not. American tenor Stephen Costello, who has previously made a good impression at the COC as Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor and the Count in Rigoletto, gives a strangely unvaried performance as Roméo. Costello has a large, ringing voice, but his decision to sing all his arias forte eventually becomes quite tiring. He does occasionally sing mezzo forte when singing something gentle to Juliette, but he makes no attempt to colour his voice to reflect Roméo’s various moods.

Costello’s acting may be generic, but at least he makes an effort. Russian soprano Kseniia Proshina does not even do that much. She gives more the impression of an automaton than of a passionate teenager. Gounod lavishes numerous coloratura passages on Juliette which Proshina tosses off without effort. Yet, the sound she produces becomes harsher the higher the notes. Proshina also has the odd habit of singing her arias at a lower volume than her dialogue. It may be that in her dialogue she is trying to match Costello’s forte. But the lowered volume drains all her arias of their excitement, including the most famous aria of the opera, “Ah! Je veux vivre”. This is one of the least passionate portrayals of the fabled “star-cross’d lovers” that I’ve seen on stage.

Luckily, most of the comprimario roles are well taken. Bass-baritone Gordon Bintner is an especially strong Mercutio, making his character more vivid than Costello and Proshina do theirs. His account of the Queen Mab speech, “Mab, la reine des mensonges”, is one of the best-sung arias of the evening. Tenor Owen McCausland is equally strong as Tybalt. Though the character has no real dramatic function, Alex Hetherington is engaging in the trousers role of Stéphano. Her lighthearted “Que fais-tu, blanche tourterelle”, even with a not quite on-target high note, is a welcome change of tone before the fight between Tybalt and Mercutio. Alex Halliday’s deep bass-baritone makes him sound so authoritative as the Duke of Verona [sic] it’s a pity the opera does not give the Duke more stage time. Megan Latham ably sings the role of the Nurse, whom the librettists have named Gertrude.

On the other hand, Briton Mark Stone’s watery baritone makes Count Capulet sound weaker than he should be. As Frère Laurent, the normally reliable Canadian bass Robert Pomakov’s voice has started to rumble.

The chief pleasures of the evening are the COC Orchestra’s vibrant account of Gounod’s opulent score under Canadian conductor Yves Abel and the always powerful contributions of the COC Chorus. Roméo et Juliette is so well constructed and has so many showpiece arias for the principles that it is a pity the present production does not present the work in the best light. Let’s hope the COC does not wait another 33 years to stage the opera. Let’s also hope that the next time the COC stages the work, it finds a production and the principals to make the opera the exciting experience it should be.

Christopher Hoile

Photos: Kseniia Proshina as Juliette and Stephen Costello as Roméo; Kseniia Proshina as Juliette; Stephen Costello as Roméo; Megan Latham as Gertrude, Kseniia Proshina as Juliette, Robert Pomakov as Frère Laurent and Stephen Costello as Roméo. © 2025 Michael Cooper.

For tickets visit: www.coc.ca.