Mozart's story of revenge is one of the all time great pieces of opera. Don Giovanni is a womanising miscreant with a long suffering servant, Leporello, who tours Europe seducing women. At the start he is confronted by the father of a woman he has just 'had' and kills him in a duel. His distraught daughter, her fiance, a spurned woman from out of town and a peasant couple on their wedding day (Don tries to seduce the bride) then set out to bring about his downfall. However, whilst hiding from his enemies, the Don and Leporello are confronted by the statue of the dead father which comes to life and accepts the Don's invitation to dinner - but when he arrives he challenges the Don to return the favour and eat with him - not one to admit cowardice in any circumstance the Don agrees, is dragged to hell and dies. Those left sing a madrigal to natural justice. Few of the characters have many redeeming features and the opera has to be set in period or else the audience will simply see the Don for the rapist and sh*t he is and find laughing at the comic moments, of which there are many, helped along by the translation used in the sur-titles.
When one enters the auditorium the set is imposing and fabulous, massive bronze doors in front of which the statue stands, huge bronze walls covered in statues and reliefs - one is immediately reminded of the famous door to the Baptistry in Florence but there are nods to other famous statues such as winged Victory (topical as its being used on the Olympic medals currently being struck) and, rather incongruously, a couple of Rodin's. Very imposing and fascinating to look at but eventually somewhat irritating as they kept moving around all over the stage to little effect except to destroy the impression of solidity as they rocked and knocked together like big plastic ducks bobbing on a pond. Their all-over bronze colour also became somewhat oppresive after a while especially when the bronze statues came on - I'm assuming they were statues though at one point one of them accompanied the Don on a mandolin!
David Kepster sang a very strong and believable Don and, although David Soar's Leporello was also very good it was the pairing of these two that caused me some concern - they are simply physically too alike, which detracted from the comedy of them playing each other, and I really had no impression that Leporello was about to be maltreated by anyone. Camilla Roberts' Donna Anna and Nuccia Focile's Donna Elvira were lovely, beautifully sung and as believably acted as the conventions and constraints of opera allow. Robin Tritshier sang Don Ottavio beautifully and looked fab, if a little weak compared to his Donna! Sadly, Carlo Malinverno simply failed to scare me, he just didn't have the physicality or presence to strike terror nor the voice to sing over the orchestra so I lost some of his part - the most beautiful in the opera to me. Claire Ormshaw and Gary Griffiths play the peasant bride and groom and deliver suitably confused performances ... I don't think Mozart thought much of these peasants, he certainly makes them out to be somewhat slow and fickle ;-)
Lothar Koenigs conducted the superb orchestra and was a delight to watch, miming along and getting to the real heart of the music - oh, and I want the Don's coat! But in the end, good though it was, this production just failed to tip me into delight
