Reviews 2010
Reviews 2010
✭✭✭✩✩
written by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart,
directed by François de Carpentries
Canadian Opera Company, Four Seasons Centre, Toronto
May 9-29, 2010
The COC’s new production of Mozart’s Idomeneo is so well played, sung and acted it is too bad we should have to struggle to ignore the oddness of the design and direction. In this co-production with L’Opéra du Rhin in Strasbourg, director François de Carpentries relocates the the action from the period just after the Trojan War to sometime, it seems, during the first Star Trek series with the transporter room on house right (meant to be a temple) and the surface of an alien planet on house left (meant to be Crete). The futuristic impression is confirmed when the chorus of Cretan citizens appear all wearing powder blue suits and dresses in 1960s styles, usually a signal in sci-fi series that this is a utopian society that suppresses individuality as they later do when Elettra (Tamara Wilson) goes mad.
The story of Idomeneo is a variation of the Abraham and Isaac story in which a father is compelled to sacrifice his own son. Despite the surroundings, the fine cast sings with such commitment the power of the characters’ emotions carries us away. Paul Groves is excellent at conveying Idomeneo’s horror in realizing he must sacrifice Idamante (Krisztina Szabó) and in seeing a plague devastate Crete when he avoids doing so. Szabó herself gives an outstanding performance in a role originally written for a castrato. As Ilia, the captive princess Idamante loves, Isabel Bayrakdarian is in glorious voice, making it perverse that de Carpentries should keep her hidden for so long at the start of two of her arias. Tamara Wilson, however, suffers a worse fate as a second foreign princess also in love with Idamante. When she sings of her happiness of being sent away with Idamante, de Carpentries gives her eight suitcases and a makeup kit to make her look foolish. In her final showpiece aria when she goes made with despair, he has the Cretans crowd in on her so that she’s completely hidden long before its finale. Let’s show a little compassion both for the singer and her character.
De Carpentries has a penchant for initiating an unnecessary onstage action before for an aria is complete, thus distracting us just when we should be focussed. Luckily, the COC Orchestra is extremely focussed under the baton of early music expert Harry Bicket, who helps it produce such a light, clean sound one might think it was an orchestra of authentic instruments. Bicket will conduct and the wonderful COC Chorus will sing on the special May 19 performance when the COC Ensemble members, Canada’s future opera stars, take over from the present cast.
©Christopher Hoile
Note: A version of this review appeared in Eye Weekly 2010-05-10.
Photo: Paul Groves, Krisztina Szabó and Adam Luther. ©Michael Cooper.
2010-05-10
Idomeneo