Il trittico, Deutsche Oper, 30 September 2023

Michele – Misha Kiria
Giorgetta – Carmen Giannattasio
Luigi – Jonathan Tetelman
Il Tinca – Ya Chung-Huang
Il Talpa – Andrew Harris
La Frugola – Annika Schlicht
Song seller – Andrei Danilov
Two lovers – Lilit Davtyan, Andrei Danilov

Sister Angelica – Mané Galoyan
La Zia Principessa – Violeta Urmana
Abbess – Lauren Decker
Sister Zelatrice – Annika Schlicht
Mistress of the Novices – Davia Bouley
Sister Genovieffa – Lilit Davtyan
Sister Osmina – Stephanie Lloyd
Sister Dolcina – Gyumi Park
Nursing Sister – Arianna Manganello
Alms Sisters – Alyson Rosales, Kristina Griep
Novice – Maria Motolygina
Lay Sisters – Julie Wyma, Margarita Greiner

Gianni Schicchi – Misha Kiria
Lauretta – Mané Galoyan
Zita – Annika Schlicht
Rinuccio – Andrei Danilov
Gherardo – Burkhard Ulrich
Nella – Karola Pavone
Betto di Signa – Michael Bachtadze
Simone – Andrew Harris
Marco – Dean Murphy
La Ciesca – Arianna Manganello
Maestro Spinelloccio – Jörg Schörner
Ser Amantio di Noclao – Markus Brück
Pinellino – Christian Simmons
Guccio – Gerard Farreras
Buoso Donati – Derrick Amantidis

Pinar Karabulut (director)
Michela Flück (designs)
Teresa Vergho (costumes)
Carsten Rüger (lighting)
Dorothea Hartmann (dramaturgy)

Children’s Chorus (director: Christian Lindhorst) of the Deutsche Oper Berlin (director: Christian Lindhorst)
Chorus of the Deutsche Oper Berlin (director: Jeremy Bines)
Orchestra of the Deutsche Oper Berlin
John Fiore (conductor)

IL TRITTICO von Giacomo Puccini, Premiere am 30 September 2023, Deutsche Oper Berlin, copyright: Eike Walkenhorst (Suor Angelica)

Integral performances of Puccini’s Il trittico, first seen and heard at New York’s Metropolitan Opera in 1918, have seemed to gain in popularity of late. In recent years, I have seen two different productions in London (Covent Garden and Holland Park) as well as last year’s Salzburg Festival staging. The problem is largely one of cost, I suspect: to stage three operas, with decidedly different casting requirements, in a single evening does not come cheap, even if one does what one can to share resources, human and scenic. The balance will continue to shift between treating each opera as an individual work and some sense of a greater whole, and that is no bad thing. A signal virtue of Pinar Karabulut’s new Deutsche Oper staging, of which this was the first night, is that that balance and indeed the idea of the altar triptych remain central to her conception: not in a didactic or even overtly representational way, but nonetheless so as to suggest one knows the same artist and purpose are at work. In the middle stands the explicitly (anti-)Marian Suor Angelica, ‘flanked,’ as Karabulut explains in a programme interview, by ‘the dramatic tragedy Il tabarro and the grotesque comedy Gianni Schicchi’. 

Dante informs proceedings too. Gianni Schicchi has its origins in The Divine Comedy, of course, but Karabulut and her team offer a progression that takes us from the inferno of Il tabarro, explicitly headed with the celebrated inscription, ‘Lasciate ogne speranza voi ch’intrate’. It is far from an unreasonable location for the tragedy of Michele, Giorgetta, and Luigi to unfold; indeed, one might see it as approaching self-evident. What is often given in a naturalistic, or at least highly suggestive, Parisian setting, here becomes a more fantastic, invented world, with at least a hint of science fiction to it, visited at one point by curious visitors who might be from another planet. For this is certainly not an overtly Christian or theological approach, even as we progress through purgatory to paradise; indeed, it becomes if anything less so. Suor Angelica has, quite deliberately, nothing of the Christian convent to it, although its scenic connections with what has preceded and what will follow are cleverly suggested by framing elements retained, as if we were travelling upwards within a (secularised?) theatrical cupola. It is a futuristic society, or seems to be, albeit one with a perhaps unfortunate air of colourised early Dr Who. This, at any rate, is the world from which those visitors have earlier passed through another, as they will do also in the final piece, presented as a satyr play with a vengeance. We see suggested not only an entirely female world, but one in which patriarchy may actually have been superseded, or at least set to one side. If so, its mixings seem decidedly blessed—and perhaps that is the point.

Gianni Schicchi

 

Influence of the commedia dell’arte is seen throughout, in masks, in stylisation of action, and not least in Teresa Vergho’s costumes, connecting in scarlet what she describes as ‘three veritable figures of death: Michele, the Principessa und Gianni Schicchi’. I am not sure I agree when it comes to the third figure, though it is an interesting and far from insupportable thesis. The important thing is not whether one necessarily agrees, though, but that one is led to reflect. Commedia dell’arte functions as a distancing, even alienating (pre-, yet also post-Brecht) strategy, yet proves also in its relative artificiality to provide a way in to emotional directness that avoids the sentimentality to which Puccini stagings can still fall prey. The audience certainly seemed strongly to appreciate the release offered by the final piece’s presentation, living up to Karabulut’s billing of grotesquerie. Doubtless there is a vein of puritanism in my wishing for something a little more restrained, subtle even; such matters are more related to taste than judgement, and this high degree of physicality is more a mainstay of German than English theatre. 

John Fiore stepped in at short notice as conductor, replacing an indisposed Donald Runnicles. There was no doubting, doubly impressive in the circumstances, Fiore’s knowledge of the score and his ability to communicate his reading of it to the excellent Orchestra of the Deutsche Oper. At times, though – and again I think this is mostly a matter of taste – I found the sound a little too pre-packaged: without wishing to essentialise, this seemed a rather transatlantic understanding of Puccini, made, as it were for the Met. (Fair enough, one might say, given that is precisely where the operas were made for.) Surface sheen and extraordinary dynamic range were characteristic, yet so was stereotypical ultra-broadening for vocal climaxes—and, sadly, no attempt to evade or silence the applause within operas this helped provoke. I missed a little more Wagnerism – doubtless I would – though I greatly appreciated the unapologetic refusal to tone down the shock, in context, of Puccini’s bitonal and other explorations. Petrushka may be a little too apparent in Il tabarro, but there are many, many worse models. And if the Seine were less apparent visually – the water we saw was somehow both more elemental and more figurative, Stygian perhaps – we certainly heard it loud and clear as a character of its own in the score.

Il tabarro: Michele (Misha Karia), Luigi (Jonathan Tetelman)

 

Misha Kiria, Salzburg’s Gianni Schicchi, played the (anti?)-hero here too, as well as Michele. His versatility and sensitivity rightly garnered prolonged audience approbation. Likewise Mané Galoyan’s heartfelt, properly differentiated Suor Angelica and Lauretta. Violeta Urmana’s Zia Principessa proved a typical star turn: almost, one might say, an ‘also starring…’ moment. Carmen Giannattasio and Jonathan Tetelman, doubtless assisted by the production, brought undeniable sexual chemistry to their portrayal of Giorgetta and Luigi; it was difficult to take one’s eyes and ears off them, whether apart or together.  Andrei Danilov’s Rinuccio was similarly as ardent as one could wish for, a winning development of his (retrospective) cameo as the Song seller in Il Tabarro. Andrew Harris’s Simone and Annika Schlicht shone as Simone and Zita respectively. But there was little in the way of weak vocal links—and plenty of character to even the smallest performance. That quality was certainly shared by the Chorus and Children’s Chorus, splendidly prepared by Jeremy Bines and Christian Lindhorst. Whatever my doubts concerning a few aspects of detail, doubts that seemed from the audience reaction very much a minority response, this was an evening that spoke of the strength in depth of the Deutsche Oper as well as the enduring appeal and enigma of Puccini’s Trittico.

La bohème and Poro, Komische Oper, 19 and 20 April 2019

Komische Oper

Image: Iko Freese/drama-berlin.de

Mimì – Heather Engebretson

Musetta – Hera Hyesang Park

Rodolfo – Jonathan Tetleman

Marcello – Huw Montague Rendall

Schaunard – Michael Borth

Colline – Samuli Taskinen

Alcindoro – Carsten Sabrowski

Parpignol – Emil Ławecki

Merchant – Mathias Spenke

Customs Sergeant – Jan-Frank Süße

Customs Guard – Tim Dietrich

Barrie Kosky (director)

Rufus Didwiszus (set designs)

Victoria Behr (costumes)

Simon Berger (dramaturgy)

Alessandro Carletti (lighting)

Poros – Dominik Köninger

Mahamaya – Ruzan Mantashyan

Sir Alexander – Eric Jurenas

Nimbavati – Idunnu Münch

Gandharta – Philipp Meierhöfer

Timagenes – João Fernandes

Harry Kupfer (director)

Hans Schavernoch (set designs)

Yan Tax (costumes)

Simon Berger (dramaturgy)

Jürgen Hoffmann (lighting)

Thomas Reimer (video)

Children’s Chorus (chorus director: Dagmar Fiebach) and Chorus (chorus director: David Cavelius) of the Komische Oper, Berlin 

Orchestra of the Komische Oper, Berlin

Jordan de Souza and Jörg Halubeck (conductors).

Image: Monika Rittershaus

I do not usually review opera productions together like this, even when they might be thought to have something more obviously in common than stagings of Puccini (La bohème) and Handel (Poro; in German, Poros). On this occasion, however, it occurred to me that it might be interesting, even illuminating, to compare recently opened new productions by the Komische Oper’s present Intendant, Barrie Kosky, and one of his most celebrated predecessors, Harry Kupfer. Whether that should prove to be the case will, as always, be for the reader to decide.

An obvious comparison, or rather contrast, lies in the works and the language in which they were given. La bohème could hardly be more central to the opera repertory; finely crafted, greatly moving work though it may be, one might think it appeared on our stages a little too often. Poro, on the other hand, is one of Handel’s lesser-known works: not entirely without reason, I have to say. Puccini’s opera certainly benefited from being given in Italian, original language productions having been one of Kosky’s most welcome innovations during his tenure. Puccini in German is, for many of us, no more alluring a prospect than Puccini in English. Poro(s), however, was given, at Kupfer’s request, in German translation, harking back to his time as an assistant director at the Halle Handel Festival – which was the basis of his choice of work. It has its moments, perhaps especially in the third act, but whilst the arias are rarely unattractive, many of them could happily be transferred from one ‘character’ – does anyone really care about these people? – to another without loss. I suspect that some, at least, of the interest in this opera lies in Metastasio’s Italian – not knowing the original, I can only speculate – and that its translation not only into German, but into a somewhat prosaic contemporary German, detracts from the poetic worth and meaning. There is no need to be fundamentalist about such matters, but this seemed more an exercise in nostalgia than a real dramatic choice.

Image: Monika Rittershaus

That impression was heightened, I regret to say, by Kupfer’s production. No one would deny his place in operatic history. Moreover, recent stagings, if hardly showing him at his very best, have had much to offer. This, however, really does nothing other than move the action, such as it is, from the India of Alexander the Great’s time to that of the British Raj’s establishment. Orientalist scenic backdrops and costumes show no critical distance. Alexander’s demotion to ‘Sir Alexander’, officer of the English Crown, betokens nothing more than a change of uniform. A Union flag unfurled at the end has a little more ironic edge, given the more than usually absurd device of the lieto fine, but a brief, unmotivated shift to cricket whites earlier on at least verged on the embarrassment. Given the thinness – let us be kind – of musical characterisation here, a strong hand from the director is really needed for a critical, modern audience. What we saw here might, with the possible yet by no means certain exception of the updating, have been seen fifty or sixty years ago. Any play with the potentially fascinating disjuncture between antiquity, and two stages in British imperial history (the 1730s and the 1850s) was, so far as I could discern, entirely absent. Maybe it would have been better off staged in English…

Image: Iko Freese/drama-berlin.de

Kosky, by contrast, proved more able to draw compelling drama from his work, whilst still working essentially within a framework of what we might call ‘fidelity’ to it. The story is told clearly, bar a somewhat confusing excision of Benoît, the students’ landlord, his part sung instead by Colline (in character as Colline, unless I misunderstood). But the age old dramatic conflict between private and public comes very much to life visually and viscerally, as do questions of what we see, what we remember – and how. Photography, aptly enough for the age, lies at the heart; or, perhaps better, enables us to understand what we think of, rightly or wrongly, as the heart. The first and fourth scenes take place in Rodolfo’s studio – cramped like the garret it should be and so rarely is – and that is how Mimì comes to life: an image, invested with whatever it is he and we see in her. Not that she lacks agency, but we are left in little doubt as to the maleness of this Parisian gaze. The city, moreover, comes to life – or recedes into our memory – through faded, yet atmospheric daguerreotypes. Debussy’s claim to Manuel de Falla, cited in a programme interview with conductor, Jordan de Souza, that no one had represented Paris so well musically as Puccini, seemed very much to the fore here: past, present, even future brought together in dramatic unity that yet permitted for disjuncture, for play, for deception. The fleshpots were there too, memorably in the rotating orgy of the second act and beyond the stage for the third, but their (near-)presence was an integral part of the drama of the city, of these individuals, of their interaction, not in any sense a source of titillation. There was something painterly and indeed photographic in a dramatic sense – unlike the ‘jungle’ backdrop and statue of Poro.

De Souza was an unquestionable asset to the drama too. Rarely if ever have I heard this opera so well conducted. Often, with profit, one hears certain aspects of Puccini highlighted: Puccini the Wagnerian, Puccini the modernist, Puccini the colourist, Puccini the melodist, and so on. Here, however much of an illusion this may be – and, more important, however great the art that conceals art – it seemed that we heard not only those and other facets to the composer’s artistry held in balance and in dramatic contest, but that one heard this Bohème, this particular set of performances and production, in such balance. I can say no fairer than that. By contrast, Jörg Halubeck heightened rather than lessened the sense of the formulaic in Poro. There was rarely anything to which to object, but nor was there anything about which to enthuse. A few more strings, more warmly played, would not have gone amiss; that, it seemed, was to be attributed to Halubeck’s ‘period’ puritanism rather than to any such inclination on the players’ behalf.

If solo singing came across more strongly, with greater personality, in La bohème, that would perhaps be to be expected. There was nonetheless nothing to disappoint in Poro, even if in most cases, I suspected a more invigorating conductor (and director) might have helped. Soprano, Ruzan Mantashyan and mezzo, Idunnu Münch were for me the pick of the bunch, nicely contrasted and yet complementary. If only Handel (or rather Metastasio) had been more inclined to duets and ensembles; or, indeed, to choruses, in which one of Handel’s greatest strengths surely lies. (That is surely not the least reason for the general superiority of his oratorios.) The young cast for La bohème had wonderful chemistry as well as personality, Jonathan Tetelman and Huw Montague Rendall touching in kindred spirit and individuality as Rodolfo and Marcello. One could believe in both, feel with them, in a way never possible in the Handel opera. (And yes, I know that is not really the point.) Heather Engebretson’s Mimì duly lit up the room, personification, as it were, of the candle that insisted on self-extinction, whilst Hera Hyesang Park balanced with great expertise and sympathy the competing demands of Musetta’s personality. In short, the whole was greater than the sum of its considerable parts, whereas in Poro, both ultimately fell short. That said, both performances met with enthusiastic reception from the audience. There is doubtless room for both; there were unquestionably audiences for both too.

La bohème, English National Opera, 26 November 2018

Coliseum

Images: Robert Workman

Marcello – Nicholas Lester

Rodolfo – Jonathan Tetelman

Colline – David Soar

Schaunard – Božidar Smiljanić

Benoît – Simon Butteriss

Mimì – Natalya Romaniw

Parpignol – David Newman

Musetta – Nadine Benjamin

Alcindoro – Simon Butteriss

Policeman – Paul Sheehan

Official – Andrew Tinkler

Jonathan Miller (director)

Natascha Metherell (revival director)

Isabella Bywater (set designs)

Jean Kalman (lighting)

Kevin Sleep (revival lighting)

Chorus of the English National Opera (chorus master: Mark Biggins)

Orchestra of the English National Opera

Alexander Joel (conductor)

And still they come. The last opera I saw during my near-year of liberation from Poundland was La bohème at the Deutsche Oper. No year goes by without multiple opportunities to see it; few years now go by without my taking at least one of those opportunities. Indeed, I see that I shall now have gone to Jonathan Miller’s staging on three of its five (!) outings since it was first seen at ENO in 2009. Is there a degree of overkill, especially when it comes to a far from adventurous production? Perhaps, although I am well aware of the (alleged) reasons for a company performing the opera so frequently. Do they add up, though? Judging by the number of empty seats at the Coliseum on this, the first night, I am not sure that they do. Might that indicate that it is time to give the work a rest or a new production? Again, perhaps, although what in the present climate would be an adequate substitute for box-office certainty? Perhaps there is no longer any such thing. Is that a bad thing? For a company struggling with declining funding and years of mismanagement – remember the self-styled ‘She-E-O’, Cressida Pollock, granting interviews about how she liked to relax with a bottle of wine whilst wearing her favourite training shoes, at the same time as attempting to sack the chorus? – the answer would seem to be yes. On the other hand, might it ultimately be a prod towards diversity of repertoire, towards taking Puccini as something more artistically serious than a box-office certainty, towards asking whether a performance in an often jarring English translation vaguely ‘after’ Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica is really the best way to ‘sell’ as well as to perform this work to a multicultural audience? Perhaps. We shall see.

One very welcome aspect of this performance – and possible justification for retaining the production a little while longer – was the opportunity it granted, well grasped indeed, to a young cast including two of ENO’s Harewood Artists: Nadine Benjamin and Božidar Smiljanić. Benjamin’s Musetta is very much her own woman, no mere memory of other Musettas we have heard – or claim to have heard (‘does not efface post-war memories of Dame Ermintrude Heckmondthwike, “Ermie” we called her…’). Not that she was different for the sake of it, quite the contrary, the crucial facets of Musetta’s character coming through bright and clear, but fresh too, very much an acquaintance as well as a reacquaintaince – and a vocal acquaintance too.  Smiljanić is likewise an able actor and impressed greatly both as soloist, insofar as possible for a Schaunard, and in ensemble. Likewise David Soar as Colline, his final-act moment something truly to savour. Nicholas Lester’s Marcello was definitely a cut above the average, rich and, where appropriate, ardent of tone, hinting cleverly at far more to the character than we ever officially learn (surely so much of the trick to a compelling Puccini performance). Simon Butteriss’s comedic turns as Benoît and Alcindoro even had a doubter such as I consider the approach (Miller’s, I suspect, more than the artist’s) perfectly justified.

Last yet anything but least, our pair of star-crossed lovers, played by Jonathan Tetelman and Natalya Romaniw, showed themselves (mostly) sensitive artists who could yet project to the back of the largest of theatres. (Alas, the Coliseum remains not the least of ENO’s problems, whatever audience members ‘of a certain age’ might claim.) Romaniw’s Mimì proved perhaps the more moving early on, but that is more likely a consequence of the opera itself than of any great performative disparity; both certainly moved in the final tragedy of the work’s final minutes. If only they had not on occasion – under instruction, I suspect – played to the gallery, treating their ‘big moments’ as stand-alone arias. The real culprit here, I think, was Alexander Joel. His conducting of the ever-excellent ENO Orchestra was incisive and mostly unsentimental, but he seemed incapable of thinking – or at least projecting – a greater unity to each act, let alone to the score as a whole. Of Puccini’s ‘symphonism’, we heard little or nothing.

As for Miller’s production, ably revived by Natascha Metherell – who surely deserved a curtain call – it is what it is. Paris updated to the thirties looks beautiful, occasionally desperate too; Personenregie is keen. As mentioned above, I am more reconciled to its comedy than I first was. Moreover, I rather like – some do not – the glimpses we catch of characters off the set as such, carrying on with their lives. Something a little challenging or interesting, though, would surely not go amiss in the future. As yet, few if any directors seem to have matched Stefan Herheim’s challenge in his superlative Norwegian Opera production, let alone gone beyond it. Will time tell? Perhaps.