Reviews
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3 principals energize 'Tosca,' overshadow uninspired stagingBy Kenneth LaFave
A triple-threat casting job keeps Arizona Opera's ultimate production of the season shining in spite of pedestrian visuals and ho-hum staging. Of course, it's hard to lose with Tosca. The bread-and-butter of romantic opera is a punchy, dramatic piece that features torture, attempted rape, a stabbing, a shooting, a suicide and some of the most heart-on-sleeve outpourings of Italian cantillation ever rendered. So if the Arizona Opera's production of Puccini's 1900 masterpiece is something of an anticlimax as a finale to its season, blame neither the material nor the cast. As seen and heard Thursday night at Symphony Hall, the three principals of this Tosca all had dynamic stage presences, which helped greatly to energize a production that seemed to lack concept and forward motion. Heading the list was Leslie Morgan in the title role. (And what role: Here's a part where the soprano plays a soprano and is surrounded only by men sans competing sopranos. There's no other like it.) Morgan displayed dramatic vocal strength in the confrontations with Scarpia and introspective lyricism in the fabled aria Vissi d 'arte. Her beautifully resilient middle range and high notes of unforced power served the role well. She played the part as if Floria Tosca, renowned diva, were a somewhat petulant little gin, less jealous of her Mario than merely vain. And it somehow supported the opera's untenable thesis that this grown woman would fall for Scarpia's brutal trick. As Scarpia, the young baritone Stephen Kechulius made an impressive Arizona Opera debut. His was a Scarpia to admire against your will. After all, here's a man who knows that it's all a power game, that young hothead Cavaradossi's Napleon probably only will declare himself dictator when given a chance, and that the only things worth having are moments of passion, especially with women like Tosca. Kechulius was at home with the part's high tessitura and expressive demands. Tenor Robin Reed sang Cavaradossi with polished sound and intelligence. He handled the famous third-act aria, E lucevan le stelle (the bright stars shone), with restraint, the better to frame its hollow despair. There were also fine subsidiary roles from Benjamin Sorensen as intense Angelotti; Robert McGaha Jr., as the bumbling Sacristan; and Reynaldo Romo as the creepy Spoletta. James Lucas' stage direction was tired, though. There was no spontaneity to the first-act chorus, and the soldiers who marched out for the last-act execution looked like they couldn't lick a sick dog. The set, designed by Lawrence Schafer, and the costumes from Malabar lent no feeling of importance to the goings-on, no sense of magnitude. John Webber conducted with a good feel for Puccini's tug and pull, though the orchestra was too frequently too loud. And there was a ragtag quality to the orchestra. This quote - "The string choir accompanying Cavaradossi in Act III Thursday night produced quarter tones" - is from my review of the Arizona Opera's 1992 Tosca, but it still applies. Some things don't change.
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Tosca (Synopsis) |
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