What do we would like from historic romance? Ought to it replicate its time or supply escape from it? Reality and fantasy coexist incessantly in opera, however balancing these impulses proves each fascinating and troublesome in Charles Edwards’s new manufacturing of I Puritani, the primary on the Metropolitan Opera in over 4 a long time. The star-crossed pair—the Puritan Elvira and staunch Royalist Arturo—are separated first by Arturo’s divided loyalties after which, extra disturbingly, by Elvira’s growing insanity. And whereas the seventeenth Century is the historic backdrop, I Puritani is extra a mirrored image of Nineteenth-century Italian opera tropes than of the English Civil Conflict: mad scenes and cries of “la patria!”
Edwards’s manufacturing amps up each the historic context and provides in some psychoanalytic touches to its normal peril; maps of Plymouth below siege are projected, and chyrons seem to ship snippets of the English Civil Conflict timeline. There’s a couple of green-tinged mad sequence during which ghostly doubles of our characters float via the scene. Elvira paints quite a few hideous self-portraits that recall extra AP Artwork portfolio than Robert Walker, and in a climactic scene, she hurls them throughout the room and punches an arm via one among them. There’s rather a lot happening right here, in different phrases.
For an opera with a tighter grip by itself historic setting, this method might be each informative and compelling, however in I Puritani the English Civil Conflict is used primarily to offer obstacles to the lovers. The extra historical past, as an alternative of amping up the drama, solely knocks it off-kilter. Everybody appears all of the sillier for caring this a lot in regards to the star-crossed pair when the viewers is continually reminded that Scots are besieging the city. I Puritani, much more than comparable works, insists romantic difficulties take priority over horrifying modern occasions. Edwards’s impulse to beef up the darkish setting merely exposes the myopia of Bellini’s opera.
Unsurprisingly for a director who’s primarily a set designer, what does work superbly are the units. The primary act locations the viewers in a Puritan assembly home that’s without delay austere and dramatic, with out sacrificing visible curiosity or flattening his setting. The tiered seats and towering pulpit gave Edwards a number of ranges on which to position his singers, lending the entire manufacturing—particularly the primary act—welcome selection. Met newcomer Tim Mitchell’s lighting is phenomenal, with a painterly sensibility that sees nice shafts of sunshine angled downward into the faces of the actors from excessive again home windows or rising from firelit darkness, half-shadowed however nonetheless seen as in a Caravaggio portray. Afterward, the Puritan assembly home splinters aside, with dashes of sunshine crisscrossing the stage as if displaying us Elvira’s fragmentation on the very partitions. Edwards and Mitchell’s collaboration makes this manufacturing probably the most visually putting previously few years.
Edwards’s capacity to create arresting tableaux is a superb power, as is his dedication to having singers transfer; a frequent critique of mine is that administrators don’t at all times know how you can leverage the Metropolitan Opera’s large stage to adequate dramatic impact, leaving singers snoozily parked downstage heart or transferring aimlessly throughout the ground with nothing to interact with. However incessantly, the manufacturing’s dynamism provides technique to busyness and even provides confusion to the already convoluted plot. Background characters pull focus from the principals throughout arias, difficult-to-make-out work journey up the house, and using little one doubles for Arturo and Elvira within the mad scenes and dream sequences was neither dramatically clarifying nor emotionally compelling. Claus Guth’s Salome might have succeeded with this tactic earlier this 12 months, however let’s not overdo it. There are a couple of different missteps that mar this manufacturing. Gabrielle Dalton’s costumes are by turns austere and splendid, and he or she manages to make even the Puritan characters look smooth and costly, however her option to type Elvira in Act III as a pixie-cut-sporting waif recalled Anne Hathaway as Fantine in Les Miserables too intently for my style.
Lisette Oropesa, a soprano whom I incessantly admire, was by turns good and bumpy because the pathetic Elvira, who sings what seems like a file variety of mad scenes. The slower cavatinas displayed Oropesa at her finest—wealthy rivers of nuanced, full of life sound—however the vocal fireworks anticipated within the cabalettas had not sufficient sparkle, with moments of effortful coloratura and some breathy, pinched excessive notes. Laurence Brownlee, just lately lovable as Tonio in La Fille du Régiment, was an exceptionally robust Arturo, with a fair, ahead sound that completely balanced brightness with depth. He’s well-suited to this function; regardless that it doesn’t benefit from Brownlee’s effervescent attraction, his Arturo was near-unimpeachable vocally and solely gained momentum because the opera drew to its shut.
Because the lovers’ principal antagonist Riccardo, Artur Ruciński was the opposite standout. He has a dimensional, scrumptious baritone that leans towards bass in its richness; his Act I aria “Ah, per sempre” was a shocking emotional excessive level, as was his duet with Christian Van Horn’s Giorgio. Van Horn, who has a crisp metallic bass, was persuasive and heartfelt as Elvira’s beloved uncle and advocate. Eve Gigliotti has solely a little bit to do because the secret-queen Enrichetta, however delivered an enormous sound in her quick time on stage.
All of the singers had been supported by veteran visitor conductor Marco Armiliato, who’s a beneficiant and delicate interpreter of Bellini, in a position to deliver out each the magnificence and the occasional bouts of navy bombast with grace.
Whereas Edwards’s manufacturing veers into the dangerously overstuffed by the third act—his option to stage the ultimate moments of the opera with Arturo embracing the ghost of his father was unusual and nonsensical—there may be nonetheless a lot to commend in his daring visible type, even when his concepts pressure on the seams of his materials. Arturo and Elvira’s romance ends with a shocking reprieve; Cromwell’s forces save the day and, insanity forgotten, the lovers can reunite. I Puritani is tragedy with a contented ending, one which at all times feels pressured and unrealistic whatever the manufacturing. At its finest, it displays that shred of hopefulness romances at all times supply—that love would possibly, for a second, overcome the forces of historical past.
On one other observe, you received’t be seeing as a lot of me on Observer’s pages transferring ahead, and to all these studying this, I need to thanks. As a scholar and a singer, writing these evaluations has meant a lot to me, as has the work of the group of editors at Observer who’ve polished and printed my writing. It has been a deep honor and extraordinary pleasure to put in writing on this platform, although this isn’t essentially goodbye. Should you’d prefer to proceed studying my articles and evaluations, together with a 2026 season preview with all the issues I’m most wanting ahead to listening to this 12 months, use this hyperlink to enroll in my electronic mail listing. Pleased New 12 months to all—might yours be filled with opera. With that, exit Madame Ferrari. On to the following stage!
