Fresh from its success with Scottish Opera, this acclaimed David McVicar production of La Traviata is sure to now give Welsh National Opera a much-needed shot of sure-fire success after some of the eyebrow-raising offerings of late.
The dark but well lit sets and costumes are sumptuous enough to make audiences feel they are been rewarded for their financial investment without simply being spectators at a chocolate box, bums on seats, crowd pleaser. Celebrated director McVicar, with his designer Tanya McCallin, knows better than that.
The flowing black drapes, the exquisite costumes of late 19th century Paris, the flood of champagne, all convey both the exuberance and elegance of this moralising and whoring society and its impending fin de siècle doom.
McVicar has shown he can handle the often cringing chorus scenes in La Traviata – and we have plenty of these at WNO - superbly while also bringing fresh interpretation to the domestic drama. Here is a director able and comfortable with his craft; from the servant sleeping curled at the bottom of Violetta’s death bed to the gypsies at Flora’s party with a risqué Moulin Rouge-style routine.
Greek soprano Myrtò Papatanasiu is a thrilling Violetta. In this role debut she is a convincing courtesan genuinely wracked by the dilemma of choosing between worldly pleasure and love and then between her new found happiness and self-sacrifice.
Papatanasiu is the lynch pin of this production and she demonstrates she is a singer of intelligence and impressive technique, wrenching the emotion from the role and producing a towering Violetta.
Alfie Boe makes a suitably immature Alfredo. He is nicely awkward and innocent in the first act and fiery and out of control in the second. There are times when his voice disappears into the chasm of the stage but at others he is robust.
Dario Solari received the approval of the first night audience as a particularly aloof and dismissive Germont not quite gaining our sympathy for his own dilemma and a father.
The chorus is in excellent form, no doubt delighted they don’t have to make fools of themselves this time while Andrea Licata’s conducting lacks fire but, that said, does not act against the voices.
Apparently the marks on the stage are supposed to be Violetta’s tombstone. I thought the large O was where she was supposed to throw her champagne glass in Act One. If so, like McVicar’s production, it would have been a bull’s eye.
WMC until October 1 then touring.
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