Tobias Mill – Charles Cunliffe
Fanny – Luiza Willert
Edward Millfort – George Curnow
Joseph Slook – Johannes Moore
Norton – Duncan Stenhouse
Clarina – Chloe Harris
Sam Brown (director)
Joshua Gadsby (lighting)
Teresa Poças (costumes)
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| Images: Craig Fuller |
Rossini’s second opera and his first to be staged, the one-act La cambiale di matrimonio has been given a sparky, polished revival by Royal Academy Opera in the UK premiere of Eleonora di Cintio’s new critical edition. (The world premiere took place last November at the Royal Opera House in Muscat.) A fine team of young performers, ably directed by Sam Brown, made a good case for the piece without (wisely, I think) trying to turn it into something that it is not. Carl Dahlhaus’s far from pejorative claim that there was ‘nothing to understand’ about Rossini’s music, as opposed to Beethoven’s, has come in for a great deal of criticism: much of it seemingly failing to understand the admittedly over-binary opposition Dahlhaus drew. Whatever the truth of that, this farsa comica, to a libretto by Gaetano Rossi, is not the sort of thing one goes to for hidden depths or really for interpretation at all. It is less a case, in that irritating contemporary formulation, of ‘it is what it is’ than, as Dahlhaus pointed out, of being a ‘recipe for a performance’. That is what it received here—and a very good one too.
Bright designs and zany, sharply executed antics tend to work well in Rossini’s comedies. Here, an initial preponderance of yellow, later joined by other primary colours, set the scene or rather continued it from a similarly perky account of the overture, a vivid curtain-raiser in the hands of Johann Stuckenbruck and the Royal Academy Sinfonia. Indeed, orchestra and singers, conductor and director were splendidly in sync throughout, lightly suggesting that Wagner’s should never be considered the only aesthetic. (For what it is worth, Wagner’s portrayal of Rossini as a purveyor of ‘absolute music’, whilst undoubtedly pejorative in some ways was also admiring, both consciously and unconsciously. It is perhaps better considered as pointing to a fork in the aesthetic road not entirely unlike Dahlhaus’s.) Enough, anyway, of Teutonic musings. The attempt of an English merchant, Tobias Mill, to sell his daughter Fanny to a Canadian businessman Joseph Slook was clearly mapped, with keen eyes and ears for a musical as well as dramaturgical structure and trajectory already prophetic of later Rossini. In a comedy of manners as well as action, English snobbery is mocked, whilst stereotypical portrayals of the foreigner (Canadian rather than ‘American’, as the cast’s spoken cries persisted in reminding the libretto as well as us) are subverted, Slook so appalled by Mill’s actions that he helps unite Fanny and her lover, the bookmaker Edward Millfort and names Millfort his heir. Slook may look brash and act strangely (initially) but his sympathetic character as well as young love win out over old and frankly mercenary ways. The music does not quite all ‘sound the same’, though one can hear why some might say so. The point is surely more that it enables and propels the action in words and gesture; this is not a Gesamtkunstwerk, but nor is it trying to be.
Charles Cunliffe’s Mill used words (and music) skilfully to create his own predicament. Commanding stage presence did not detract from vulnerability and wounded pride as the story progressed. Luiza Willert’s Fanny was quite outstanding, alert to the tricks of the trade Rossini had already picked up (arguably in some cases created) and how to use them. This is clearly repertoire for which she has a gift. So too does George Curnow, often perplexed (in a good way) yet ultimately victorious as Edward Millfort. Johannes Moore’s Slook truly held the stage, again through a fine blend of words, music, and acting. His journey from larger-than-life foreigner to kindly benefactor was keenly observed and portrayed throughout. Chloe Harris and Duncan Stenhouse similarly both impressed as Clarina, Fanny’s maid, and Norton, Mill’s clerk. Their contribution to ensembles as well as their solo moments underlined that, for all the coloratura, this is an ensemble piece. And that, precisely, is what we saw and heard.
