Like Verdi’s
Nabucco - reviewed
on this site in November 2007 (Euroarts 2056228) - this
production of
La
Traviata was staged within the St Margarethen Opera Festival.
This is held in Europe’s biggest natural stage, once a Roman
quarry, near Eisenstadt, some 25 miles south of Vienna. The
gigantic stage might be appropriate to such spectaculars
as
Aida and
Nabucco but not, I argue, for the
more intimate scenes within
La Traviata. On arrival,
the audience is greeted with the aspect of the outside of
a Palace. This façade divides in two and the halves roll
back to reveal a central stage area itself so wide that when
the Violetta and Alfredo or Alfredo and his father Giorgio
wander towards opposite ends there is a huge gulf between
them ruining any sense of intimacy.
I have to say I
have very mixed feelings about this production. First the good
news. As you can see from the stills, the two youthful leads
Kristiane Kaiser and Jean-François Borras are very personable;
Kaiser having a statuesque beauty and slim figure appropriate
to a consumptive and Borras, a long-haired stocky hero, passionate
and wilful. It is nice for a change to see both leads looking
so young and not as so often happens, one or the other. They
are both in good voice too; Kaiser, with stamina aplenty, has
a most attractive timbre and she projects strongly. In this
she is aided by some good sound engineering although it is
a pity that the
cast had to wear those forehead-mounted microphones
another drawback of so vast an arena. Apart from an odd missed
note or two, she is impressively secure in her upper and middle
registers. Borras makes a dashing lover moving imaginatively
through passionate declarations of love to anxiety, anger and
despair. Their duets blend in honeyed legato. But why on earth
couldn’t the producers have edited out the intrusive airplane
noises that marred the exquisite romanticism of their Act I ‘Un
di felice, eterea’. Georg Tichy’s Germont is a tad stiff but
in strong oaken tones he cajoles iron-fist-in-velvet-glove
like, and consoles - winning audience approval for his famous
Act II aria, ‘Di Provenza il mar, il suol’.
The bad news. I
have mentioned a number of difficulties already but I feel
I must add one or two more. Personally I found a costumed audience
in boxes on-stage distracting. The final Act III setting was
sparse indeed made up of rows of many candles on the floor
downstage and a series of armchairs upstage – could they not
have given poor Violetta a
chaise-longue? Then the
Act II Scene II ballet sequences were weird featuring cross-dressers
in the gypsy and Spanish dances. But I will finish carping
by mentioning the DVD box presentation. As you can see it is
hardly representative. Why the lady in red? Why is her back
to us and why is she gazing out to sea when
La Traviata is
located in Paris and in country villa? No artists are mentioned
on the cover and there is no detail about them within the booklet!
I have to say that
I prefer to recommend an alternative DVD - Zeffirelli’s
La
Traviata (
TDK
DVWW-OPLTR) which is a feast for the
eye with Domingo conducting and drawing first class performances
from
his orchestra,
chorus and cast – particularly Stefania Bonfadeli who is an
outstanding Violetta.
Kristiane Kaiser
shines as Violetta – the stand out element in a satisfactory
production.
Ian Lace