Conductor - Maurizio Benini; Maria Stuarda - Joyce DiDonato; Elisabetta - Elza van den Heever; Roberto Dudley, Earl of Leicester - Matthew Polenzani; Giorgio Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury - Matthew Rose; Guglielmo Cecil, Lord Burghley - Joshua Hopkins; Anna Kennedy - Maria Zifchak.
Story. First, some background is in order. The threats against Mary, Queen of Scotland, were such that she fled to England and sought protection from Queen Elizabeth, her first cousin, once removed. Since Mary was a threat to Elizabeth’s reign as Queen of England (Mary being Roman Catholic, and Elizabeth being daughter of Anne Boleyn, accused of being an adulterer by Henry VIII), Elizabeth decides to jail Mary. The story is based on the last few days of Mary Stuart’s life. The plot of the opera revolves around a (fictional) encounter between Elizabeth and Mary, which seals Mary’s fate.
The opera begins with Elizabeth entertaining a marriage
proposal, and worrying about what to do with Mary. It also happens the Earl of Leicester admires
Mary and wants to plead for her life’s being spared. He convinces Elizabeth to have a meeting with
Mary; Elizabeth is to go on a royal hunt, and Mary is to be allowed to go
outside her prison. Despite the Earl’s
pleading, Mary loses her temper with Elizabeth and insults her, thus sealing
her own fate. Mary is indeed executed,
but before she goes up to the scaffold, she takes off her coat to expose the
red dress she wears as a badge of Catholic martyrdom.
We had prime balcony seats for a performance of this opera last week. Because of our trip to Boston, we moved the date to today. By the time I went to the box office to exchange the tickets, only seats in the upper reaches of the family circle were available. (Well, $200 tickets were still available.) So here we were.
Our trip into the city was quick until we hit the 20s on
the Westside Highway. The tie-up was not
that bad, mostly because of buses trying to turn into the Port Authority. We also found off-street parking along
Amsterdam Ave. To our surprise, Ollie’s
was closed. There is a posted sign
saying it moved a few blocks away, but we couldn’t figure out where it was, so
we decided to go to East Szechuan Garden instead. In reading up on Ollie’s, there was a fire on
January 4, and the location would be indefinitely closed. There is no mention of this new
location. Makes one wonder exactly what
happened … good thing no one was hurt.
Back to the opera.
Let me first say this was as perfect an opera as I can expect, or have
experienced. The story was compelling,
the singing was generally exquisite, the music was easy to like, the sets did
the job, and – despite or because of our location in the house – the acoustics
was good. Let me elaborate on each of
these aspects.
Each of the five scenes (over two acts) was compelling in
its own right, but the most dramatic one has to be Act 1, Scene 2, where
Elizabeth had this encounter with Mary under of the pretexts of a royal hunt
and a stroll in the forest next to the prison.
The plan cooked up by Leiceister was for Mary to beg Elizabeth for
mercy, but instead she lost her temper due to the insults and prodding of the
Queen, calling the Queen the sorry descendent of Ann Boleyn and a “vile
bastard.” Even though it was a tense
moment that (according to the opera) sealed Mary’s fate, the exchange brought a
chuckle to the audience. Here you really
cheered for Mary’s choice of honor over life, but you also wished that she made
a different choice. Of course, a minor
detail is that this incident never happened.
The last scene (Act 2, Scene 3) where Mary was led to her execution also
stood out for Mary’s defiance and willingness to forgive. It was high drama when the red dress she was
wearing to symbolize Catholic martyrdom was revealed before she went up the
scaffold to meet her death. A side
remark, I was puzzled why Mary did her curtain call with white hair. From what I read, when her severed head was
held up, her head fell off its wig (red hair) and it was revealed that she had
short white hair.
Joyce DiDonato was perfect for the role, at least for
someone sitting at the back of the house.
First her singing was just great.
Her soft high notes just floated clearly across, carrying with them the
wistfulness and regret of her situation.
She also has a very strong low register voice as befits a
mezzo-soprano. I have to contrast her
acting skills with those of Anna Netrebko.
I remember remarking when Anne Boleyn was saying “forgive forgive
forgive” her face continued to show “hate hate hate.” Here I thought DiDonato got all the emotions
right, even though I don’t see why she should find any forgiveness in her heart
given how the story unfolds. I heard her
recently singing the role of Sycorax in The Enchanted Island, but in the opera
Danielle de Niese singing the role of Ariel stole the show. We saw Matthew Polenzani doing a great job as
Nemorino in The Elixir of Love. Here he
also did great as Earl of Leicester, a much older figure. Other principals did well also, portraying
their characters well.
Like several other Donizetti’s operas (Anna Bolena comes
to mind), there are not many singable tunes in the opera. However, nice-sounding music dominates, even
though most of it is in support of what is happening on stage. And the orchestra appeared to be a reduced
size one. As I observed after the last Donizetti opera
(L’Elisir d’Amore), this opera also contains a lot of ensemble music (duets to
sextets). The South African Elza van den
Heever did a great job as the cold and vengeful Elizabeth. She sang with clarity and forcefulness, and
exuded animosity towards Mary. History
is kinder to the actual Queen, considering her a great Monarch. Also, as with the Elixir performance we saw,
Maurizio Benini was the conductor. There
was not a lot of chorus work, but the song that started the last act, from a
group of Mary’s supporters lamenting her fate, was full of anguish. Not quite to the level of the Hebrew’s Chorus
in Nabucco, but great nonetheless.
The sets were on the simple side, but the changes in
scenery within the same act were done seamlessly and quickly. I do wonder a bit why such a simple setup was
chosen for this new production. Perhaps
the Met spent too much on the Ring? To
satisfy the macabre-inclined, I must describe this scene with the executioner
standing next to a block. Mary has to
walk up a staircase (alone) and the curtain comes down when she is half-way.
A few other remarks on what I have learned about Mary
Stuart. It seems the verdict is still
out on whether she really plotted to have the Queen assassinated. Her ultimate “revenge” was her son actually
succeeded Elizabeth and reigned as ruler of England and Scotland. There is no mention of Earl of Leicester in
what I have read, much less the possible romance between them. Also, evidently in Italian the word is
pronounced “lei-ces-ter” instead of the simple “lester” in English. Finally, this series constitutes the premiere
performances of the opera at the Met, which I find somewhat surprising.
At the risk of repeating myself, this was simply a great
performance. I am glad we went, even
though we didn’t have the best seats (at least as far as view is concerned.) I have no complaints about the acoustics,
though.
I have located several reviews of this opera. This New York Times review also sings praises
to DiDonato and the performance, it also talks about how van den Heever shaved
her head to accommodate the wigs she has to wear. The New York Post review was a bit harsher,
using the word “skimping” for DiDonato where most would call “effortlessly
floating.” It made the interesting
remark that several scenes had their keys lowered to suit DiDonato’s voice.
No comments:
Post a Comment