Friday, March 25, 2016

Madama Butterfly

Photo

Ana María Martínez and Robert De Biasio in “Madama Butterfly.” CreditMarty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera

Half an hour of intermission separates the first and second acts of Puccini’s“Madama Butterfly” at the Metropolitan Opera. But in the libretto that gap covers three years of suffering for the title character, a betrayed young geisha waiting in vain for the return of her American husband.
The soprano Ana María Martínez, appearing in her first leading role at the Met on Friday, made you disbelieve your watch. Yes, you’d returned to your seat after just 30 minutes, but in that time years seemed to have gone by onstage. Ms. Martínez’s Butterfly had transformed, in both manner and sound, from a demure, besotted girl to a weary, hardened woman. She seemed, quite simply, to have aged.
It was a bit of theatrical magic in a beautiful performance: modest and delicate, yet rising to glimpses of the epic in her final aria of self-sacrifice. (She would do well to drop a single false note: a cartoonish moment of pummeling Sharpless, the American consul, with her fists.) While Ms. Martínez’s voice has a low, dark center of gravity that makes the more conversational passages of the score really speak, once she had settled into her upper register, her high notes came out like Butterfly herself: reserved yet movingly clear.
Her artful restraint was matched by those around her, including the conductor Karel Mark Chichon, who made his company debut with a performance that kept the drama flowing inexorably forward, cutting the saccharine without stinting on Puccini’s lushness. Another new Met artist, the baritone Artur Rucinski, sang Sharpless with an easy, mellow tone, if also a blandness that made too little of this crucial, conflicted character.
Roberto De Biasio’s soft-focus tenor made the caddish Pinkerton a mild, ineffectual presence. The mezzo-soprano Maria Zifchak, who reigns in New York as Suzuki, Butterfly’s maid, was, as ever, dependably affecting in Anthony Minghella’s vivid production, one of the triumphs of the Met’s past decade.
But it was Ms. Martínez’s evening. Now in her mid-40s, she has had an active career, but not at the Met. She appeared as Micaela in a 2005 run of “Carmen,” then disappeared until a few months ago, when she played Musetta in “La Bohème.”
She wasn’t originally scheduled for Butterfly, one of her signature roles, but jumped into the first two performances — the second is on Monday evening — as a replacement for the ill Met veteran Hei-Kyung Hong. It would be wonderful to see Ms. Martínez on the company’s roster more often.

[Met Performance] CID:356400 

Madama Butterfly {864}
Metropolitan Opera House; 03/25/2016


MADAMA BUTTERFLY {864}
Giacomo Puccini--Giuseppe Giacosa/Luigi Illica

Cio-Cio-San.............Kristine Opolais
Pinkerton...............Roberto Alagna
Suzuki..................Maria Zifchak
Sharpless...............Dwayne Croft
Goro....................Tony Stevenson
Bonze...................Stefan Szkafarowsky
Yamadori................Yunpeng Wang
Kate Pinkerton..........Edyta Kulczak
Commissioner............David Crawford
Yakuside................Craig Montgomery
Mother..................Belinda Oswald
Aunt....................Jean Braham
Cousin..................Patricia Steiner
Registrar...............Juhwan Lee
Dancer..................Hsin-Ping Chang
Dancer..................James Graber
Cio-Cio-San's Child 
(Puppet)................Kevin Augustine, Tom Lee, Marc Petrosino

Conductor...............Karel Mark Chichon

Production..............Anthony Minghella 
Director/
Choreographer...........Carolyn Choa 
Set Designer............Michael Levine 
Costume Designer........Han Feng 
Lighting Designer.......Peter Mumford 
Puppetry................Blind Summit Theatre


Madama Butterfly is a co-production with English National Opera and the Lithuanian National Opera

Spread Your Wings and Fly: Madama Butterfly at the Metropolitan Opera

 02/22/2016 03:47 pm ET | Updated Feb 22, 2016

Whether or not it was because of Giacomo Puccini‘s tuneful and heart-wrenching score, New York Fashion Week, or the first outing of soprano Ana Maria Martínez, a singer curiously absent from the Met, in a prima donna role, the Metropolitan Opera was jam-packed for the premiere of Madama Butterfly on Friday, February 19th.
2016-02-20-1455991444-8322739-Butterfly_1781as.jpg
Zifchak and Martinez
Most opera fans are familiar with Puccini’s drama about a Japanese geisha who is disappointed and humiliated when Pinkerton, the U.S. Naval officer she married and believed to be faithful, returns from a three-year absence with a new wife to retrieve the child Pinkerton and Butterfly had together. Stripped of her honor, Butterfly then kills herself with a ceremonial dagger. Replete with “Asian” motifs and intense demands from the singers and orchestra, Butterfly is especially difficult to execute for such a core work of the standard repertoire. This run of performances at the Met (13 in total) was originally supposed to feature Patricia Racette andKristine Opolais as Butterfly, but because of a series of repertoire changes and illnesses, Racette’s performances bounced from her to Hei Kyung Hong (who steps into the kimono starting February 27th) to Ana Maria Martínez for only two performances.
Martínez possesses an ample, amber-colored voice with a resonant, grainy middle, and she uses it with intelligence and security. However, her high notes have the tendency to fade away, and on Friday, she just couldn’t get to the musical climaxes, the high notes, at the heart of all of Butterfly’s arias, even despite smart and sensitive phrasing choices throughout. It’s not that the high notes aren’t there, but that there is little force behind the upper register compared to the thrust in the rest of the voice. Other high notes, though, defied this tendency and were spun into dazzling pianissimi. Martínez’s Butterfly was refreshingly reserved at the beginning of the opera, and slowly descended into desperation throughout. She wasn’t naïve, but an inevitable victim of a society that objectifies women. And by the end, when Butterfly is faced with dishonor and suicide is the only option, it still feels like a conscious choice. Martínez is light on her feet and hard to take your eyes off of. She played well with the other singers and was able to easily and gracefully negotiate the raked stage in the gorgeous but obviously-cumbersome kimono she wears for much of the opera. Butterfly, though well-executed by her in almost every category, just might not be the perfect fit for her voice.
As Pinkerton, Roberto De Biasio hammed it up as a playful playboy and was more or less unmemorable. The voice is slender and a size or two too small for the Met, and he struggled to distinguish himself in any of the ensembles. Both his arias were muscled through, and though not for lack of trying, he seemed mismatched with Martínez’s much more assured Butterfly.
Artur Rucinski, a baritone with a serviceable voice who made his Met debut on Friday, gave a performance that suffered from both a lack of line and garbled diction as Sharpless, the American Consul. Maria Zifchak, a stalwart Suzuki, may be showing signs of a wobble, but she is still one of the few Met artists that consistently delivers with a gleaming voice and warm stage presence.
2016-02-20-1455991536-521069-Butterfly_1379As.jpg
Martinez and Rucinski
Karel Mark Chicon, also in his Met debut, conducted with uniformly brisk tempi, and though he was able to emphasize the drama in Puccini’s inherently dramatic score, the singers and chorus seemed frequently stranded and searching as the opera relentlessly surged on.
Anthony Minghella‘s production, now ten years old, is still an intelligent staging that gives the music every opportunity to shine. It’s also singer-friendly - there is room for singers to put their mark on the characters. Michael Levine‘s sets are spare and evocative, Han Feng‘s costumes are detailed and striking, and Peter Mumford‘s lighting is just phenomenal. Blind Summit Theatre provides the puppets, one of which stands in for Butterfly’s son, Trouble. After ten years, audiences seem to be finally acclimated to this initially arresting but ultimately effective innovation.
2016-02-20-1455991637-464610-Butterfly_0776As.jpg
Martinez and De Biasio
Martínez performs the title role one more time on Monday, and then Hei Kyung Hong, singing Butterfly for the first time in her long career, takes over the part until March 5th. Kristine Opolais steps in for the remaining performances and the run ends April 12th. Other singers to join the cast are Gwyn Hughes Jones andRoberto Alagna as Pinkerton and Dwayne Croft as Sharpless. Tickets availablehere.
Photos by Marty Sohl

Saturday, March 19, 2016

L'Elisir d'Amore



Opera’s Brightest New Stars on Bringing L’Elisir d’Amore to the Met

L’Elisir d’Amore

EXPAND
Vittorio Grigolo as Nemorino and Aleksandra Kurzak as Adina in Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore.
Photo: Marty Sohl / Metropolitan Opera

“The crowd goes wild” isn’t an expression typically associated with opera, but at the premiere of the Met’s production of the Gaetano Donizetti classic L’Elisir d’Amore, the audience did exactly that. The comedy moved viewers to a standing ovation, uproarious laughter, and more than a few postshow Instagrams. That a 183-year-old story can captivate a contemporary audience is a testament to the timelessness of Donizetti’s work and to the talent of L’Elisir’s stars. The production hinges on the rapport between its leads: Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo and Polish soprano Aleksandra Kurzak. Dynamic onstage, with a spark that resonates in every scene, the pair shine as lovers Nemorino and Adina. And as faces of opera’s new generation, Grigolo and Kurzak defy preconceived notions of what it is to be an opera singer.
With his charismatic swagger and love of Formula 1 racing, it would be easy to mistake Grigolo for a matinee idol in the mold of Marcello Mastroianni, but the moment he begins to sing, his calling is clear. Few have had their voices dubbed national treasures, and in Italy, Grigolo is part of an elite group of performers that includes legends like Luciano Pavarotti, who served as an early mentor. For Grigolo, stepping out onstage each night is a gamble not unlike getting behind the wheel of a sports car. “There is a similarity between singing and racing: a powerful voice and an orchestra, a powerful engine and the orchestra of the engine,” says Grigolo. “It might not seem like you’re risking your life with opera, because every move is calculated, but there is a risk every night. It’s live and there’s no faking it.”
Grigolo’s connection with the character of Nemorino dates back to childhood. Growing up with parents passionate about opera, and on the cusp of an era when arias were as popular as pop songs, he fell in love with L’Elisir’s signature, “Una Furtiva Lagrima.” “I have to say that this is one of my favorite roles,” Grigolo says. “Ever since I was a little kid, I loved ‘Una Furtiva Lagrima.’ I didn’t know where it came from, but I connected to it.” The lighthearted nature of the story also had its appeal: After years of playing tragic heroes, a touch of levity was in order. “I was drawn to the incredible, beautiful arias, but I like stories with a happy ending and there aren’t too many of those in opera,” he says. “This is one story that at the end you can feel enjoyment. It is a light repertoire opera for a light voice. If you have this soft kindness in your voice and still have a soft approach to the bel canto request, you have a chance, even if your voice is more lyrical or more powerful.”
For Kurzak, who has played Adina at London’s Royal Opera House, the Vienna State Opera, and the Gran Teatre del Liceu, her latest turn offers an opportunity to reinvent the role she’s perfected. Classically trained at the conservatories of Wroclaw and Hamburg, Kurzak isn’t just a singer; she’s a doctor with a Ph.D. in music. And she is convinced the genre isn’t going anywhere. “Opera has been alive for hundreds of years. There is always this fear because of modern art, cinema, or other art forms, but nothing compares to a live show. It’s nice to have a recording, but there’s nothing like seeing it live and experiencing the gift of the human voice.”
Coming from a musical family—her mother, Jolanta Zmurko, is a respected soprano—Kurzak has been immersed in the world of opera since birth. “Opera has always been what drives me,” says Kurzak. “I grew up watching all the shows backstage. My father used to play in the orchestra and my mother is a singer and was my teacher, so at home I listened to a lot of opera, even as a child.” Now a mother herself, Kurzak admits her playlist has changed a bit in the past few months: “Now I’m listening to ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes’ or ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’!”
Like any good romantic-comedy pair, Kurzak and Grigolo display palpable chemistry, trading coy looks in between arias and making each joke land perfectly. Pulling off the humor is no small feat. “To play comedy is a very difficult thing. It’s much easier to make people cry sometimes,” says Kurzak. “You hear the beautiful music and you just start to tear up. I cry whenever I see Madame Butterfly, but to make the people laugh, everything has to be precise.”
Though the libretto is loaded with wit, much of the onstage fun is the result of improvisation. While theater actors frequently elevate their performances with impromptu add-ons, opera isn’t always as malleable. But the free-form approach suits both performers. “It’s good that both of us like this style of working,” Kurzak says, smiling. “There are people who want things to always be the same, but we don’t mind improvising a little bit.” For Grigolo, the added spontaneity is what keeps things exciting. “I’m not against rehearsal, but sometimes a little less makes things fresher. You don’t want to discover too much about your partner and then in the end it gets boring. You want to keep a fresh attitude and way of interacting with each other.”
Their spark onstage carries over into their real-life relationship as collaborators. “I enjoy his presence—what can I say, he’s just Vittorio, you have to love him,” says Kurzak of her costar. “He’s honest, which is an important quality when you’re creating something together—that and the belief that you have a partner that you can count on.” For his part, Grigolo credits Kurzak with helping him appreciate a new side of the opera’s leading lady. “I think working with Aleksandra made me rediscover this character. I was never so much in love with Adina,” says Grigolo. “It’s beautiful, and I think it would be fun to do many roles together in the future.”
For the moment, Grigolo and Kurzak are content to deliver their very best at the Met. “The real judge is the public,” says Grigolo. “When you see them happy, you feel happy. There is no fee that can fill this gap between being an artist and receiving what you’ve worked and sacrificed for. You can’t put a dollar sign on that. All you can do is make yourself proud of what you’re doing and make people enjoy that moment.”


L’Elisir d’Amore

EXPAND
Vittorio Grigolo as Nemorino and Aleksandra Kurzak as Adina in Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore.
Photo: Marty Sohl / Metropolitan Opera
“The crowd goes wild” isn’t an expression typically associated with opera, but at the premiere of the Met’s production of the Gaetano Donizetti classic L’Elisir d’Amore, the audience did exactly that. The comedy moved viewers to a standing ovation, uproarious laughter, and more than a few postshow Instagrams. That a 183-year-old story can captivate a contemporary audience is a testament to the timelessness of Donizetti’s work and to the talent of L’Elisir’s stars. The production hinges on the rapport between its leads: Italian tenor Vittorio Grigolo and Polish soprano Aleksandra Kurzak. Dynamic onstage, with a spark that resonates in every scene, the pair shine as lovers Nemorino and Adina. And as faces of opera’s new generation, Grigolo and Kurzak defy preconceived notions of what it is to be an opera singer.
With his charismatic swagger and love of Formula 1 racing, it would be easy to mistake Grigolo for a matinee idol in the mold of Marcello Mastroianni, but the moment he begins to sing, his calling is clear. Few have had their voices dubbed national treasures, and in Italy, Grigolo is part of an elite group of performers that includes legends like Luciano Pavarotti, who served as an early mentor. For Grigolo, stepping out onstage each night is a gamble not unlike getting behind the wheel of a sports car. “There is a similarity between singing and racing: a powerful voice and an orchestra, a powerful engine and the orchestra of the engine,” says Grigolo. “It might not seem like you’re risking your life with opera, because every move is calculated, but there is a risk every night. It’s live and there’s no faking it.”
Grigolo’s connection with the character of Nemorino dates back to childhood. Growing up with parents passionate about opera, and on the cusp of an era when arias were as popular as pop songs, he fell in love with L’Elisir’s signature, “Una Furtiva Lagrima.” “I have to say that this is one of my favorite roles,” Grigolo says. “Ever since I was a little kid, I loved ‘Una Furtiva Lagrima.’ I didn’t know where it came from, but I connected to it.” The lighthearted nature of the story also had its appeal: After years of playing tragic heroes, a touch of levity was in order. “I was drawn to the incredible, beautiful arias, but I like stories with a happy ending and there aren’t too many of those in opera,” he says. “This is one story that at the end you can feel enjoyment. It is a light repertoire opera for a light voice. If you have this soft kindness in your voice and still have a soft approach to the bel canto request, you have a chance, even if your voice is more lyrical or more powerful.”
For Kurzak, who has played Adina at London’s Royal Opera House, the Vienna State Opera, and the Gran Teatre del Liceu, her latest turn offers an opportunity to reinvent the role she’s perfected. Classically trained at the conservatories of Wroclaw and Hamburg, Kurzak isn’t just a singer; she’s a doctor with a Ph.D. in music. And she is convinced the genre isn’t going anywhere. “Opera has been alive for hundreds of years. There is always this fear because of modern art, cinema, or other art forms, but nothing compares to a live show. It’s nice to have a recording, but there’s nothing like seeing it live and experiencing the gift of the human voice.”
Coming from a musical family—her mother, Jolanta Zmurko, is a respected soprano—Kurzak has been immersed in the world of opera since birth. “Opera has always been what drives me,” says Kurzak. “I grew up watching all the shows backstage. My father used to play in the orchestra and my mother is a singer and was my teacher, so at home I listened to a lot of opera, even as a child.” Now a mother herself, Kurzak admits her playlist has changed a bit in the past few months: “Now I’m listening to ‘Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes’ or ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’!”
Like any good romantic-comedy pair, Kurzak and Grigolo display palpable chemistry, trading coy looks in between arias and making each joke land perfectly. Pulling off the humor is no small feat. “To play comedy is a very difficult thing. It’s much easier to make people cry sometimes,” says Kurzak. “You hear the beautiful music and you just start to tear up. I cry whenever I see Madame Butterfly, but to make the people laugh, everything has to be precise.”
Though the libretto is loaded with wit, much of the onstage fun is the result of improvisation. While theater actors frequently elevate their performances with impromptu add-ons, opera isn’t always as malleable. But the free-form approach suits both performers. “It’s good that both of us like this style of working,” Kurzak says, smiling. “There are people who want things to always be the same, but we don’t mind improvising a little bit.” For Grigolo, the added spontaneity is what keeps things exciting. “I’m not against rehearsal, but sometimes a little less makes things fresher. You don’t want to discover too much about your partner and then in the end it gets boring. You want to keep a fresh attitude and way of interacting with each other.”
Their spark onstage carries over into their real-life relationship as collaborators. “I enjoy his presence—what can I say, he’s just Vittorio, you have to love him,” says Kurzak of her costar. “He’s honest, which is an important quality when you’re creating something together—that and the belief that you have a partner that you can count on.” For his part, Grigolo credits Kurzak with helping him appreciate a new side of the opera’s leading lady. “I think working with Aleksandra made me rediscover this character. I was never so much in love with Adina,” says Grigolo. “It’s beautiful, and I think it would be fun to do many roles together in the future.”
For the moment, Grigolo and Kurzak are content to deliver their very best at the Met. “The real judge is the public,” says Grigolo. “When you see them happy, you feel happy. There is no fee that can fill this gap between being an artist and receiving what you’ve worked and sacrificed for. You can’t put a dollar sign on that. All you can do is make yourself proud of what you’re doing and make people enjoy that moment.”

Watch Vogue.com’s most popular videos now:

Vittorio Grigolo is undeniably one of the big superstars of the opera world. The Italian tenor, with his movie star looks and passionate singing, has captured the world's stage with an inimitable stage presence and sparkling spontaneity that makes every performance of his quite the fascinating adventure.




Those best qualities have been rather apparent in his recent run of performances of Donizetti's "L'Elisir d'Amore" at the Metropolitan, where he has worked alongside an overall A-team to bring the comedy to life. Unfortunately that has not been enough to overcome what has become, over the years, a confounding production by one of the Met's most inconsistent mainstay directors.


Bartlett Sher's Production - A Tale of Two Incongruent Stories

Bartlett Sher's "Barber of Seville" remains his Met masterpiece, and even that production, with its extended stage can be somewhat problematic for the Met orchestra's sound. Nonetheless, Sher's productions since have been rather haphazard and inconsistent with his most disappointing work in Verdi's glorious "Otello" coming earlier this season. The "Elisir" is right there with it in terms of the confusion it induces. A rather "traditional" interpretation of the comedy, the production ultimately has not justified its right to exist. Sher tries out a concept in the first half of the opera before utterly abandoning it in the second, likely having realized that it simply does not work within the frames of this intimate opera. The end result? Two seemingly incongruent operas.



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Equally confounding is the all-important diary that Nemorino carries around with him for half an opera. A prop that the audiences sees as crucial for the character ultimately tells us nothing about him and likely could have. Also, how is Nemorino able to write pages and pages in a diary but then struggles to sign his name for Belcore? Sher sidesteps the issue by ignoring the diary altogether after a while, likely hoping the audience forgets about it as well.

Though Adina's sense of power might be Sher's most thought-provoking idea, it also makes the character far more fickle and undeserving of Nemorino's love by the end of the night.

Sher's abundance for visual distraction is also on full display here with the stage's arc curtain having no real motivation for being there in the first place. One scene transition is ever-annoying, with people carrying out blades of grass while singers are performing a delightful scene in front of them. Try as they might, viewers are stimulated by any kind of new movement and this area is no exception. The decision to stage the wedding in the barn might be a funny touch, but it does not really make much sense. This set is so bare in its use of mis-en-scene that it might as well not exist once the wedding party is gone.

The wardrobe of course looks like every other Sher opera to date, which is either a brilliant way of making everyone feel like his operas live in the same universe or simply a lack of creativity or interest in differentiating one character from another across different works.

But enough with Sher's production, which is now a few years old and seemingly here to stay for some time. The singers are where the real value is.

Albeit, they all seem to be in a different show.

The Italian Superstar Delivers Vocal Nuance Amid Confused Portrayal

Grigolo's Nemorino, with his leather jacket, looks more like James Dean than a simpleton that is too innocent to see that others are using and abusing him. Hence his attempts to get close to Adina in the early going look less innocent than they probably should be. In fact, Nemorino's behavior as he tries to cuddle up to the reading Adina come off as distracting and quite frankly annoying. Anyone wondering why Adina is put off initially by Nemorino only needs to watch this scene. The result is that Grigolo's Nemorino jumped between being too self-knowing and too stupid throughout the opera, making him ultimately difficult to truly get behind. During the duet "Una parola, o Adina," his Nemorino responded to Adina's first poet metaphor with a rather forward rendition of his own metaphor, grabbing her and sitting her on his lap, the confidence oozing out of his voice and body language. A few moments earlier he was sitting around with a book in his lap, not seemingly bothered by Adina telling him why he was rejecting her.

In the scenes with Dulcamara, his Nemorino was the innocent "idiot" he is often called throughout, his puppy eyes wondering from the bottle of Bordeaux to the con-man Dulcamara. His boyish enthusiasm at drinking the Elixir was in stark contrast to his character from the first scene, but certainly came off rather believable in the new context. His drunkenness however was undeniably fantastic to watch, his movement and his voice slowly losing its balance and edge. When he re-entered the stage in the second act to find himself ambushed by the chorus of women, Grigolo sang with a nasal quality, the phrasing short and muffled. It was a winning moment, one of the few instances where a singer uses his full vocal powers to create said effect and really drive home the sense and feel of vocal drunkenness.

Speaking of vocal powers, Grigolo's were at their best here and undeniably transcended an inconsistent character portrayal (though it must be emphasized that he is a compelling actor through and through). If bel canto is defined by singing with a wide palette of colors, then few tenors could claim to possess the arsenal that Grigolo has in this respect. His voice can move from a rather pointed spinto-like quality to the most delicate of vocal threads to something rather granular and coarse. It is all there and it is used with tremendous precision that still feels fresh and unpredictable. Few phrase like Grigolo does, singing pianissimo during the Act 3 ensemble that features chorus, Adina and Dulcamara while risking being overpowered. And yet through it all, his sudden shaping pulls the audience in deeper into his vocal portrayal. The same happened during the second half of the duet with Dulcamara. In the duet with Belcore, Grigolo's singing had a rather heavy feel to it, the tenor giving the singing more desperation than one might come to expect from Nemorino at this point, but also highlighting just how low he has come.

Of course the question of the day will be the famed "Una Furtiva Lagrima," the touchstone of the work for any tenor. Grigolo sang it here with tremendous introspection, his voice mezzo voce throughout the early portions, the phrasing crescendoing subtly, but then being reigned in. Finally at the change of the key from minor to major on "Cielo si puo morir!" making the transition from Nemorino's guilt toward his exultation all the more potent. That he chose to prostrate himself at this point only added to the emotional resonance. The choice to singing the second "Si puo morir" at the end of the aria as an utterly sublime pianississimo brought back the emotions of the opening of the aria once more, giving us the sense that Nemorino still carries his mixed emotions about seeing Adina suffer for him. To punctuate it the final phrase with a gloriously suspenseful swell was the final masterstroke on Grigolo's vocally prolific rendition. As an added bonus, his final celebratory vocal embellishments upon finally being given the love he has so desperately sought, added to the character's charm and elation.



Aleksandra Kursak Comes Into Her Own in Second Act

Aleksandra Kursak's Adina was likely the most grounded in Sher's production throughout Act 1, her emphasis on being the woman in power apparent from the forefront in Act 1. But that also meant that her character was rather confusing to the viewer, Adina alternating from giving Nemorino demeaning looks at some instances and then frustrated ones when she ignored her. One never truly got the sense that Adina truly loved him, but simply pitied him and her final actions as the first curtain drew to a close seemed to come from an egotistical need rather than true love. This might seem all well and done if it is in fact the ultimate interpretation of the production, but it threatened to contradict the effusive cries of "t'amo" that Adina professes four or five times with increasing ardency at the climax of the work.

Kurzak's portrayal in the second act told a very different story. It told the story of a woman that was interested in flirting with Nemorino throughout and found herself suddenly frustrated by his not returning her interest. It told the story of a woman who was on some level used to getting her way, but still rather emotionally connected to those around her. It told the story of a character, which finally faced with coming to terms with owning up to her feelings, is actually rather vulnerable and possibly at a loss as to what to do. This all made for a credible delivery on many fronts, even if it sometimes came into conflict with the what Sher's staging demanded in Act 1. Kurzak's finest moments of the night came in the second act when the bare staging meant that she was allowed free reign to control the scenery and play her own Adina on her own terms. And in this regard it was a far more fluid and likeable character. From her comic flourishes and flirtatious vocal intonations during the duet with Dulcamara to the interpolated crying after the final note of the duet's first section, this was a character alive with emotion.

During the aria "Prendi, per me sei libero," Kurzak sang rather quietly, her voice drawing the listener in, casting a hypnotic spell. Every phrase was sculpted elegantly, every ebb and flow of her voice capturing the listener. Her coloratura during the jubilant cabaletta was refined, hammering home the sense of excitement over Adina's newfound emotional freedom.

Different Operas for Corbelli and Plachetka

Alessandro Corbelli was as hilarious as ever, but his Dulcamara seemed to be fixed in a more farcical staging of "Elisir." His accented body language and facial expressions seemed more in line with a more relaxed portrayal, which certainly came into grave dissonance with Sher's more serious tone.

As with Kurzak and Grigolo's performances, it seemed to come into its own during the second half of the opera when the scenery and staging demands allowed more freedom to the actors. He had a lot of fun with Kurzak during their duet.

Baritone Adam Plachetka seemed like his character was stuck in a tragic opera the entire time, making his narcissistic Belcore come off as tyrannical and needlessly aggressive.

In the pit conductor Enrique Mazzola provided his singers with solid support, though he seemed in a bit of a rush early on in "Una furtiva lagrima," running ahead of Grigolo while the tenor extended a long note.

If great singing is of great interest to you, then this "Elisir d'Amore" will provide that in spade. But if dramatic cohesion and comedy is what you crave, this "Elisir," as directed by Sher, is simply not structured for such a job.