Michael R. Anderson
From left to right: Tia Cleveland as Marcellina, Joel Rathmann as Figaro, Anna Whiteway as Susanna and Thomas Weis as Bartolo.
University Opera’s first production of the 2015-16 season, launched at Old Music Hall on Friday, Oct. 23, is a staging of The Marriage of Figaro that is a delight to hear and see. Figaro also opens the second season of visiting director David Ronis.
For the four performances of this production, almost every role is double-cast: one Friday-Sunday team and another Saturday-Tuesday one. The singers on Friday evening were all very fine, again attesting to the excellent quality of students drawn to the School of Music’s vocal and opera programs. Benjamin Schultz and Gavin Waid were somewhat light of voice (for Figaro and the Count, respectively), but confident in their roles. Yanzelmalee Rivera was sometimes overly heavy of voice of the Countess, but sang eloquently, while Erin K. Bryan was a deftly girlish Susanna, Figaro’s bride. Alaina Carlson was simply a delight as the puberty-ridden page Cherubino.
I very much liked Meghan Hilker as Marcellina and Thomas Weis as Bartolo, both perfect in every way for the characters who turn out to be Figaro’s parents. The other roles were fulfilled very ably, and the chorus did its small parts well. Conductor James Smith, as always, drew fine sounds from the UW Symphony Orchestra.
If the production was satisfying musically, it also worked extremely well dramatically. Ronis has a flair for drawing gestures, expressions, movements and interactions out of his singers, making them genuine actors who flesh out their characters. The result was a fine realization of the humor in the libretto and the music, without overstepping into rowdy vulgarity. The usual score cuts of the arias for Marcellina and Don Basilio in Act IV were followed here, by the way.
Particular credit is due to set designer Dana Fralick, whose elegant but movable units provided charming contexts for the action. I must express some disappointment, however, with the surtitles, which were not always well synchronized with the music and often dropped out unnecessarily.
Mozart’s opera, to Lorenzo da Ponte’s libretto, was a somewhat softened treatment of the originally very caustic play by Pierre Beaumarchais, filled with strong criticism of a society just on the verge of the French Revolution. In his program notes, Ronis points up its messages for our own times, but without banging away at them. The production, indeed, is handsomely "traditional."
Remaining performances are at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 24 and Tuesday, Oct. 27; and 3 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 25.
