The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Yes, I know that platitude has been overused and outlived its usefulness, but boy does Sir David McVicar know how to use it to grand effect. He put together a superb production of Pietro Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci; opera's most famous tragic double bill. Tenor Marcelo Álvarez has dared to take on both the roles of Turiddu and Canio in this production, which is no easy feat. Joining him were sopranos Eva-Maria Westbroek and Patricia Racette in the roles of Santuzza and Nedda respectively, with baritone George Gagnidze as both Alfio and Tonio (again not an easy task). McVicar's production sets the double tragedy in the same Sicilian village just fifty years apart.
I can't do a play-by-play like I enjoy doing because this one is a double-header, and double-headers don't lend themselves well to that sort of thing.
In Cavalleria Rusticana, before the beginning of the story, Turiddu came back from war to find his beloved Lola married another man. He seduced Santuzza and then abandoned her when Lola got jealous of them. Santuzza was then excommunicated.
Santuzza confides in Turiddu's mother Lucia about what happened between them. When Turiddu arrives, Santuzza pleads with him, but he dismisses her. Lola enters and mocks Santuzza for her excommunication. After Lola leaves with Turiddu for Mass, Santuzza tells Alfio about their adultery (and immediately regrets it). Alfio confronts Turiddu who challenges him to a duel. They fight and Turiddu is killed.
In I Pagliacci, an impoverished traveling comedy troupe, headed by Canio, comes to town. In the comic play the put on, Canio plays Pagliaccio and his wife Nedda plays Pagliaccio's unfaithful wife, Colombina. Unfortunately for everyone involved, Nedda is cheating on Canio with another man, Silvio, in real life. When Canio finds out, the results are disatrous.
The operas are different in style and McVicar wanted to capitalize on that. So Cavalleria Rusticana is set in the year 1900 and is very dark and very brooding. It is described as a backward looking piece that seems more reminiscent of early Verdi. There is a lot of emphasis on rituals and religious ceremonies. Everyone was clad in either black or dark grey. Santuzza spent most of those ritual scenes off to one side, as she has been excommunicated.
In this production, I Pagliacci is set in the same village as Cavalleria, but takes place fifty years later in 1948. This on is described as a more forward looking piece and largely about conversation (such as one would find in a television soap opera of our day). The mixture of comic and tragic elements and the blurring of lines between public and private lives is what makes this production work.
McVicar worked hard to make the Act 2 comic play feel funny as opposed to just looking funny. You have clownish servants doing juggling tricks or slapping each other in the face with whipped cream. There is a chicken puppet which seems to move on its own, but is in fact under a false arm (later on the chicken is cooked and refuses to stay dead). Giving the play a lot more tangible humor makes the tragic finale all the more devastating.
Eva-Maria Westborek outdid herself in this opera, besting her own performance of Zandonai's Francesca da Rimini just two years ago. She was always onstage, doing something whether it was crying on Mamma Lucia's shoulder or praying during the intermezzo.
Marcelo Álvarez and George Gagnidze worked the hardest out of everyone in the cast. They were in both Cavalleria and Pagliacci, with Álvarez singing both Turiddu and Canio, and Gagnidze singing both Alfio and Tonio. Both were spectacular both vocally and dramatically. As Turiddu, Álvarez was somewhat indecisive in regards to Lola and Santuzza. And Gagnidze as Alfio seemed more cocky and overconfident. And then made a smooth Álvarez went from being the heart-breaker to being heart-broken as the unfortunate Canio in I Pagliacci. To hear him sing the famous lament that closes Act 1 was something else. Gagnidze was very good as Tonio. For some weird reason they gave him the final line of the opera, "La comedia e finita.",* to him rather than to Canio.
Patricia Racette as Nedda was also very good. She brought a lot to the character, namely Nedda's conflicted emotions. Should she stay with Canio, or leave with Silvio?
In the original libretto, Nedda is supposed to be around seventeen or eighteen whereas Canios is in his forties or fifties. In this production, they looked much closer in age, maybe a couple in their late thirties or early forties. I liked that bit; it meant that now the things that are troubling their relationship are a little more complex. So Nedda is not just a young wife who hates her life and wants to be free; there's more to it. It could very well be that they were madly in love when they first married, and the stress of traveling around the time and the grinding poverty they deal with took its toll on both of them.
I don't like Silvio very much, but I have seen a baritone who played him very passionately before (as in, could make this one-dimensional character real). I forget the name of the man who sang Silvio here, but his interpretation made the character seem like a cardboard cut-out and was not particularly enthralling in his performance.
Splendid production. Sir David McVicar has got to bring this one to Madison.
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*"The comedy is over."
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