George Frideric Handel's beguiling opera Alcina premiered in London in 1735 in a 1,800-seat theater at the Covent Garden Theatre set on the site of the current Royal Opera House. It was popular during Handel's day, and proved a hit over three centuries later on Saturday night at the nearly packed Santa Fe Opera's 2,128-seat Crosby Theatre.
The seasonal debut of the four-hour baroque opera was
presented by Harry Bicket, the London-grown conductor who played the
harpsichordist in the Handel tradition before an impressive cast handled by
prolific New York director David Alden—one known for his postmodern approach to the
stage.
"It was time for us to do a Baroque opera again," Daniel R Zillman, the director of media and public relations at SFO, tells SFR, adding
that the repertory last presented the dramatic style of 17th- and 18th-century
artistic expression in Handel's Agrippina
in 2005 and again in Vivaldi's Griselda
in 2011.
Alcina demands the audience's
attention with a mixture of expressive arias and sensual recitatives. "It's a
unique monkey dance," Zillman says. "Great baroque music and one of the most
fun productions I've seen on this stage."
The story of Alcina
originated with Ludovico Ariosto's 1532 poem "Orlando Furioso," featuring God, the Archangel Michael, Charlemagne and Merlin. Italian
composer Riccardo Broschi wrote the libretto for a 1728 opera; Handel
recycled that libretto and made the bewildering baroque genre accessible by
slimming the cast to four main characters.
In the latest version, a sorceress named Alcina lures lovers
to her island—an abandoned theater under Alden's direction—and holds them under
her spell until she tires of them, turning them into beasts, rocks and
plants. As we join, Alcina captures Ruggiero, a young man who comes to
forget his fiance, Bradamante.
As Alden explains in the show's program, Ruggiero "escapes his mundane life by sneaking into an
abandoned theatre and conjuring up the image of his ideal woman, Alcina—opera
diva, entertainer, seductress." Alden notes that he was "loosely inspired" by
Woody Allen's 1985 movie The Purple Rose
of Cairo, in which "Mia Farrow's character escapes her drab existence by
watching the same film day after day, until the characters on screen join her
in her reality."
In the first of three acts, Bradamante, disguised as her own
brother Ricciardo, visits the theater with her tutor Melisso to rescue
Ruggiergo. Alcina's sister, Morgana, falls in love with "Riccardio," even
though she's already loved by Oronte, Alcina's general. Meanwhile, Oberto, a
young boy, asks "Riccardio" and Melisso to help him find his father, also a
captive of Alcina's love spell.
The plot might seem complicated. But, with a bit of focus
and suspension of belief—made easier by the nighttime performance beneath Santa
Fe stars—the storyline is easy enough to follow, even for a first time
opera-goer such as this reporter.
Bicket's interpretation of Handel's music accentuates the
hearty themes of passion, jealousy and revenge, even if bringing Ruggiero back
to reality means "a bittersweet 'happy ending'" with him marrying Bradamante in
suburbia. Alden asks, "Will he ever truly shake off the haunting Alcina?"
Alden also added to Handel's exploration of
"gender-fluidity" of "male and female role-playing" by casting women to play
Ruggiero and Bradamante, as well as Oberto. "When Bradamante, Ruggiero's
fiancee sung by a mezzo, dresses as a man to rescue her lover, a man sung
originally by a castrato but today by a mezzo, you almost need a scorecard to
track the complications and gender-bending titillation."
The cast is led by powerful soprano Elza van den Heever, who
plays a seductive Alcina. Though darkly unhinged, the enchantress shows signs
of grief and appears almost sympathetic in her struggle to keep her lover. Does
she really care for Ruggiero? Would Ruggiero be better off in the theatre than
suburbia?
Sharing the stage, mezzo-soprano Paula Murrihy gives an
agile performance as the charmed Ruggiero. Mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack impresses
in both her male and female roles, as bass-baritone Christian Van Horn helps
inspire the entertaining search throughout the theatre. Soprano Anna Christy may
steal the show, however, as the controlling and flirtatious Morgana, drawing
laughs during her humorous and often sexualized dances beside beasts played by
acrobats from local circus troupe, Wise Fool New Mexico.
The audience is assured laughs, but the dreamlike nature of Alcina inspires more private chucking
than howling. Nonetheless, the cast received heavy applause throughout
the performance.
Scenic and costume designer Gideon Davey, lighting designer
Malcolm Rippeth, and choreographer Beate Vollack create a minimalistic setting
that keeps the focus on the singers. The performance called the crowd to
consider the overall nature of events. And so doing, SFO’s Alcina becomes a
first-rate introduction to baroque opera and an enjoyable way to spend a night
thinking about the blurred lines of reality and fantasy in one’s own life.
Santa Fe Reporter