{"id":1663,"date":"2019-06-10T10:46:08","date_gmt":"2019-06-10T10:46:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/?p=1663"},"modified":"2019-07-30T13:58:30","modified_gmt":"2019-07-30T13:58:30","slug":"lets-twist-again-partying-with-the-don-and-the-donald","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/2019\/06\/lets-twist-again-partying-with-the-don-and-the-donald.html","title":{"rendered":"Let’s Twist Again: partying with the Don and the Donald"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The first two new productions in Garsington Opera\u2019s 30th<\/sup>\nanniversary season both feature wild parties with lots of on-stage dancing. Smetana\u2019s\nThe Bartered Bride <\/em>somehow combines1950s dancing, from the era when partners\ngestured at each other separately (and sexily, we innocently thought then), more\noften than they actually held one another, with Czech folk-dance. But it\u2019s the\ntitle, not the Twist,  that gives me\ntrouble. The alliteration in the English title of The Bartered Bride<\/em> is\nso catchy that you can see why Prodan\u00e1 nevesta<\/em>, or Die verkaufte\nBraut<\/em>, as its more or less non-Czech-speaking composer, Bed\u0159ich Smetana, referred\nto it, wasn\u2019t too concerned. Still, the \u201cbartered\u201d heroine, Ma\u0159enka, would be\nbetter described as \u201cthe paid-for bride\u201d or \u201cbride for sale,\u201d rather than a girl\nwho was swapped for some valuable, tangible goods. The opera is sung in Czech\nin the wonderful new Garsington Opera production directed by Paul Curran and\ndesigned by Kevin Knight; so we have to be grateful that the programme includes\na note on the pronunciation of Czech. As Smetana wrote in a letter of 1860\n(quoted in the programme): \u201cHaving been educated in German going back almost to\nmy early childhood\u2026I have to confess to my disgrace that I cannot express\nmyself or write properly in the Czech language.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

         The \u201c\u0159\u201d in Ma\u0159enka\nand in Bed\u0159ich, is pronounced as \u201czh as in measure,<\/em>\u201d which explains why\nthe printed characters look so odd to English speakers, though they were no\nbother to the librettist, Karel Sabina. I applaud the decision to sing the\npiece in Czech, though Smetana himself might not have understood every word being\nsung, as the libretto seems to repeat every line at least five times, and\nhearing them in Czech is not only euphonious, but reduces the hearers\u2019 chances\nof boredom considerably, making us more tolerant of the wafer-thin plot. It is\nnot only text that is repeated in this three-act comic opera; it also seems to\nhave Wagnerian leitmotifs, with musical phrases associated with the dramatis\npersonae. At least, I think I could hear these musical repetitions, and I was\npaying attention.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photo credit Clive Barda<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Bartered Bride<\/em> is a\nrollicking comedy that turns upon a single premise to do with the revelation of\nthe groom\u2019s identity and the marriage contract that turns upon it, proving that\nit\u2019s the wise son who know his own father. Thus the vocal part seems to occupy little\nmore than half the work\u2019s length \u2013 the remainder being the well-known overture\nand the other orchestral parts in which the chorus sings a little, but dances a\nlot, and<\/em> accompanies the superb circus performances we witnessed at\nGarsington, featuring everything from juggling and unicycles to gymnastic feats\nand multiple hula hoops. Darren Royston\u2019s choreography has to be performed by\nas many as two dozen members of the chorus, and, of course, not all of them can\npolka to Olympic standard. However, the goofiness of it all, combined with\n1950s provincial British costumes, won my heart and loud applause.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photo credit Clive Barda<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Paul Curran moves his large troupe\nriotously yet daintily across, and up and down, the large stage. Even the scene\nchanges were entertaining, as the cast moved huge sets on castors, changing the\n1st<\/sup> Act village hall with its stage and kitchen into the village\npub, complete with bar, tables, and separate glass doors for the Ladies\u2019 and\nGents\u2019 conveniences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

         Musically this\nwas the sort of great evening we locals expect from the Garsington Opera in its\n30th<\/sup> anniversary year (following its founding at their home,\nGarsington Manor, by our own dear friends Leonard and Rosalind Ingrams, and its\neighth year at Wormsley, and the Getty family\u2019s generous 50-year renewal of the\ncompany\u2019s lease). The Dutch conductor Jac van Steen had the crack Philharmonia\nOrchestra following his baton, along with the large Garsington Opera Chorus, and\nthere wasn\u2019t a single dud among the principals. Jenik (Brendel Gunnell) already\nhas a few Wagner spinto tenor roles to his credit, and I expect we\u2019ll hear him\nin some dramatic roles in the bigger houses. Ma\u0159enka (Natalya Romaniw) is\ndescribed in the programme as Welsh, and works and lives in Texas. We have\nalready heard her high-powered, lyrical soprano as Garsington\u2019s Taytana, and\nshe is a familiar name on opera cast lists all over the place.  Joshua Bloom sings the role of the cynical Kecal,\nthe village mayor, whose main activity is match-making, and his bass has a\nbeautiful baritonal quality, despite the fact that he is a bit svelte for heavy-duty\nSchwerer Spielbass<\/em> roles. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

         I, and the loudly\ncheering audience, hugely enjoyed Michael Boyd\u2019s weird production of Don\nGiovanni<\/em>, which designer Tom Piper has set in a \u201cwoke\u201d artistic environment\nsomewhere in southeast London (I\u2019d guess). As clued by the programme\u2019s still photograph\nof Ed Harris as Jackson Pollock in the 2000 film, it opens in an artist\u2019s\nstudio, the site of one hell of a party. The party-goers are dressed in contemporary\nclothes, with chic trainers on their feet, and some adorned with hipster\nbeards.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photo credit Johan Perrson
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

In the scene above, Donna Elvira\n(the stunning Australian soprano, Sky Ingram), suitcase in hand, is crashing\nthe party, in search of her faithless sposa<\/em>. Earlier two artists\n(looking uncannily like Mark Rothko and his young assistant in the play, Red<\/em>)\nheaved buckets of paint at an enormous blank canvas, stage right. Don Giovanni\n(a wicked-looking Jonathan McGovern) slashes the canvas \u00e0 la Lucio Fontana, and\noozes himself through it, as though it represents the female pudenda, but\nwhether in the sexual act or childbirth, it\u2019s impossible to say.  This part of the set jarred with my art\nhistorian companions, who didn\u2019t appreciate the apparent homage to 1950s artistic\npractice. However, in the middle of the stage are two, gold-framed, colossal\nClaude landscapes \u2013 and on stage left, an old-Masterish gilt-framed painting of\n(I\u2019d guess) Amor and Venus. My expert companions hazarded a guess at Bronzino\nas its painter; but a happy hour of online research left me unable to confirm their\nattributtion. In any case, the painting is apparently there only to be\nvandalised, by a single brushstroke, making a blue blindfold across the face. I\nsuppose the older paintings are meant to strike a note of contrast between the\nart of the past (including its music) and the moral, artistic and political chaos\nof the present.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It has crossed my mind that we\u2019re\nmeant to view the Don as the Donald, and the word \u201cincoherent\u201d applied to the\nproduction, certainly. But I sensed that the art-world atmosphere and studio\nshenanigans were meant chiefly to alter our sense of the time and place of the\nsetting, and that the guests at the party might well have been the younger\nversions of ten or so of the current Tory would-be prime ministers jostling one\nanother, and tattling tales about each other\u2019s drug preferences. A fitting milieu<\/em>\nfor this take on the Mozart-Da Ponte masterpiece, in which the Don is updated\nto an Old Etonian, and Leporello his fag. Director Michael Boyd adds a muscular\npublic school homoerotic note, as Don Giovanni not only beats his servant, but\nplants full-on kisses on Leporello\u2019s not-entirely-happy-about-it mouth. In\naddition to the Don\u2019s locker-room boasting (cue the other Donald) and class\nexploitation, Boyd\u2019s direction adds the frisson of the Don\u2019s sexually menacing his\nlackey. Bass baritone David Ireland is an exemplary Leporello, and I hope I get\nto hear his debut performance as Mozart\u2019s Figaro with the Welsh National Opera.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I liked the way both men move on stage,\nand also the lanky strength of Thomas Faulkner\u2019s Masetto. Movement\ndirector\/choreographer Liz  Ranken has made\ntheir body-language an impressive and expressive part of the drama\u2014and she has\ndone something similar in her coaching of the women. Camila Titinger\u2019s Anna goes\nfrom hysterical to dignified (and her intonation improved as the night went\non); Sky Ingram as Elvira is angry, really angry; and Mireille Asselin\u2019s\nZerlina is no wimp. Douglas Boyd conducts the Garsington Opera Orchestra with\nmore legato than crispness, but as the performance developed, I began to like\nthe long phrasing and roundness. The evening\u2019s vocal honours, though, belonged\nto the tenor, Trystan Ll\u0177r Griffiths, making his Garsington debut as Ottavio.\nHe sang his character\u2019s first aria with passion and sweetness, managing a\nthrilling ppp<\/em> that hushed the audience but was heard everywhere in the\nhouse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first two new productions in Garsington Opera\u2019s 30th anniversary season both feature wild parties with lots of on-stage dancing. Smetana\u2019s The Bartered Bride somehow combines1950s dancing, from the era when partners gestured at each other separately (and sexily, we innocently thought then), more often than they actually held one another, with Czech folk-dance. But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1663","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"entry"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbv6zV-qP","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1663","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1663"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1663\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1665,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1663\/revisions\/1665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1663"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1663"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/plainenglish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1663"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}