 |
Eugene Onegin (Simon Keenlyside)
Images: Bill Cooper |
Royal Opera House
Tatyana – Krassimira Stoyanova
Eugene Onegin – Simon Keenlyside
Young Tatyana – Vigdis Hentze
Olsen
Mme Larina – Diana Montague
Filipyevna – Kathleen Wilkinson
Olga – Elena Maximova
Peasant Singer – Elliot Goldie
Young Onegin – Thom Rackett
Lensky – Pavol Breslik
Monsieur Triquet – Christophe
Mortagne
Captain – Michel de Souza
Zaletsky – Jihoon Kim
Guillot – Luke Price
Prince Gremin – Peter Rose
Kasper Holten (director)
Mia Stensgaard (set designs)
Katrina Lindsay (costumes)
Wolfgang Göbbel (lighting)
Leo Warner (video)
Lawrence Watson (animation)
Signe Fabricius
(choreography)
Royal Opera Chorus (chorus master: Renato Balsadonna)
Orchestra of the Royal Opera House
Robin Ticciati (conductor)
Kasper Holten’s new
production of Eugene Onegin, his
first staging for the Royal Opera House, was in many ways excellent, an
auspicious debut indeed. Unfortunately, it was truly let down by some of the
most lacklustre conducting I have heard at Covent Garden. Whilst an
interesting, intriguing evening was still to be pieced together from production
and singing, it would be idle to pretend that Robin Ticciati’s jejune
performance did not detract significantly from the experience. To start with,
it seemed as though Ticciati’s reading might prove interestingly different. The
balletic side to Tchaikovsky seemed on the verge of shining through, the woodwind
section of the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House offering sparkling playing,
and what a nice change it made for once to hear the harp! Alas, it soon emerged
that those advantages had been achieved largely by default. It became
impossible to ignore the thinness of the string sound, despite a sizeable
number of strings in the pit. That was not on account of any ineptitude of
execution by the players, who remained polished throughout, but because
Ticciati seemingly wished to elicit the sound of a middle-ranking chamber
orchestra from one of the best opera house bands in the world. Fair enough if
you simply have to put up with a small number of strings, or even if you are
playing in a small house, but such was not of course the case here. More
damagingly still, the performance dragged, at times interminably so. Without
any sense of life – not to be
confused with alleged ‘airiness’ – and without any sense of Tchaikovsky’s tormented
soul, the only signs of anything dramatic being at stake had to be gleaned
elsewhere: a great pity. Let me be clear. This was not about ‘intimacy’, about
approaching Tchaikovsky’s ‘scenes’ in the manner in which they were first
performed at the Moscow Conservatoire – although the perversity did have
something in common, albeit significantly magnified, with the attempt by
Ticciati’s mentor, Sir Simon Rattle, to
present an ‘intimate’ Carmen upon the vast
stage of Salzburg’s Grosses Festspielhaus. Nor was it about actual speed; I
genuinely have no idea whether the performance was fast, slow, or middling, by
the clock. What I do know is that it dragged, despite sometimes being unduly
driven, because Ticciati proved hopelessly incapable of finding a pulse,
variable or otherwise. Instead of intimacy and interesting if unusual tempi, we
had mere thinness and tedium.
 |
| Tatyana (Krassimira Stoyanova) |
Holten’s production, on the
other hand, offered what was often a searching exploration of memory. Inscribed
into the score, its visual manifestation was effected by a number of means.
Most obvious, but far from the only example, was the use of doubles, a young
Tatyana and a young Onegin, to observe, to remind, to haunt. Mirroring the
structure – some might say the lopsidedness – of Tchaikovsky’s drama, the young
Tatyana is often seen during the first four scenes, whereas her counterpart
does not emerge until the older, wiser Onegin appears in St Petersburg. The two
young figures meet only in the final scene, offering a glimpse of what might
have been, but what is now cruelly denied. Or should that read, 'wisely denied'? For in a
fascinating gloss, Prince Gremin appears in that scene too: no longer a mere
doddery if noble old fool, he too will have to learn to live with the truth. I
can imagine that some might have found the histrionic display of the young
Tatyana during the Letter Scene a little much, but by the same token, it seems
a valid response to one side at least of the music – and Tchaikovsky’s
character. It does not last very long, moreover, and more important seems to be
the slippage between the two Tatyanas: who is writing? Who is truly affected?
Is this for once an attempt to construct, with all the potential for failure
that might entail, a character who is more than Tchaikovsky’s self-projection?
Colour is used to great
effect: an especially telling moment is the infection through lighting and film
of the outside world – or is it again a projection, this time from Tatyana
herself? – with Tatyana’s scarlet, following the Letter Scene? Has she been
rash, to put it mildly? Is this foreboding? Does her uneasy relationship to the
outside world doom her to an unhappy, unsociable life? Is this where it all
goes wrong, the moment to which her elder self will perforce return, time and
time again? The relationship between books and memory is of course not a new
concept in Onegin productions, but it
is a good one, and their presence at Mme Larina’s house, not least in Tatyana’s
hands, makes its point well. As time went on, above all in St Petersburg, it
was as if Tchaikovsky’s and Pushkin’s reminiscences were straining towards
Wagnerian leitmotif. They did not and could not reach it; technique and indeed
aspiration are quite different. But I could not help but wonder if Holten’s
Wagnerian experience played a role here. If only there could have been some
counterpart to that in the conducting, which continued signally to fail to join
up the dots. Let us hope that the production will be revived with someone else
in the pit. A conductor with whom the Royal Opera House has a strong
relationship, such as Semyon Bychkov, who has a fine Onegin recording to his name already? That might really be
something.
 |
| Lensky (Pavol Breslik) |
The cast was for the most
part excellent too. Krassimira Stoyanova’s Tatyana was beautifully sung, no
mere cipher, but a strong, flawed character, uncertain of where she was heading
and all the more credible for that. I was a little disconcerted by Simon
Keenlyside’s Onegin during the first act; it seemed coarser than I recalled
from a few years ago. But dramatic truth gained over ‘mere’ beauty, for this
Onegin gained in insight as the work progressed, quite in tandem with the
production. As ever, Keenlyside’s way with words, just like Stoyanova’s, was
pretty much beyond reproach. Beauty there was aplenty in the honeyed tones of
Pavol Breslik, every inch the Romantic poet; his verbal acuity was no less
impressive. Holten had elected to downplay, even to ignore, the homoeroticism
of the relationship between Onegin and Lensky: a pity, since it so permeates
the score, but of course the director had other ideas to explore. Instead we witnessed
two young, quite immature men as genuine rivals for the affections or at least
the attentions of their women. Olga was finely and richly sung by Elena
Maximova, whilst Diana Montague and Kathleen Wilkinson almost stole the show
with their equally fine portrayals of Mme Larina and Filipyevna. The only
disappointments were an unidiomatic Zaretsky from Jihoon Kim and an intonationally-challenged
Triquet from Christophe Mortagne. Peter Rose’s Gremin did everything it should –
and more. Likewise the Royal Opera Chorus was on splendid form, for which
Renato Balsadonna should once again receive considerable credit.
