...un altro Otello

Yes, third time...

Best yet for Cheryl. Call me crazy — you probably already do — but I could see it in her eyes that she'd outdo herself, before she'd sung a note. Fired up, perhaps, by her Helpmann the night before. Her concentration is quite staggering — every moment, every inch of her, is so completely in character. The horror and fear on her face in Act III was hard to watch.

But, as my companion on opening night pointed out — she's doing an awful lot of significant stair climbing this season.

Jonathan Summers could give children nightmares. For one scary moment, he looked up at the monitor directly below my loge seat and that cruel gaze seemed fixed on me. I nearly shuddered. And he was so adorable in Gianni Schicchi...

And (indulge/ignore me, it's my blog) this time when he strangled her beneath the stairs, one arm reached back behind her head, over the top top step. Quivered, then dropped lifeless. It was a nicely macabre touch. I do love it, too, when she drags herself back up — it's like a horror movie.

But Otello's dagger is laughably blunt. I've seen plastic knives that were more convincing.

I keep expecting to start being bored during the boys' scenes but guess what? I like all of it. That's a testament to the opera and the production, of course; and maybe my horizons are broadening after all. (But I still like Desdemona the best.) Two more booked, I may add more besides. I'll try not to follow every single one of them with a content-free post like the above.

Comments

[LadyBlogger]

Oh, you make me wish I could see it...

I like your 'content-free' posts. They're fun, and your enthusiasm is definitely contagious!

[David]

Hi Sarah

Saw Otello last night and was wonderfully surprised!! I had forgotten about how much of the this production which I saw last time around that I had forgotten about, which made it seem like seeing it for the first time.

The chorus were stupendous in the introduction.

Everyone negotiated the stairs stupendously and they became such a wonderful visual metaphor for the rise and fall of the music, the decay inherent within the plot, the changing emotions of individual characters and the imposition of will-and centered by the black atlas and the heavy burden that he shouldered. There was a scene were Iago sweeps one foot under his body onto the stair, then brings the other leg over and then springs up the stairs to meet Otello-it was just masterful choreography!!

The scene were Iago wrings the "primordal mud" from his hands was just spine-chilling and the admission of a lack of morality and the unquestioning acceptance of heaven as a story spun from "old wive's tales" was so masterfully sung that when he literally spat this at us, I was genuinely scared. There may have been no Peter Coleman-Wright, but Jonathan Summers was just stupendous.

What a revelation Jackie Dark was as Amelia. Apart from the fact that she looked overly matronly, that voice!!! When she challenges Iago in Act IV and admits to all his guilt and her innocent complicity, the hate and despair in her voice was blood-curdling-a real alto voice with bronze and dark tones.

I thought Mr O'Neill was also terrific and I am not talking about voice, but about acting. He is what he is, short and dumpy and will never ooze raw animal magnetism. He is not a natural stage creature and has significant physicality always working against him. But, what a terrific effort he made to bring out what he could in plumbing the conflict of emotion that besets Otello as he reels between his love of Desdemona and the virilent poison of Iago. It's the best he has ever done as a singer-actor and in the end, suspension of disbelief worked extremely well!!!! Sure one may have been left with a nagging doubt about how such a truly beautiful creature as Desdemona could be attracted to a small dumpy man, but he had nobility in bucketloads if not the pure animal sex appeal!!

As for Ms Barker, what can one say??? The normal superlatives seem pointless. She is just eternally Cheryl!!!! Her "awareness" of Otello descending down the stairs was gob-smacking and actually gripped me more than her "I have died and gone to heaven" Willow Song and Ave Maria.

I will dine out on the meories of this for a very long time!!!

[Sarah]

Yes I was there too last night, although further back than I might have liked.
Jonathan Summers is terrifying isn't he? Even from the back of the stalls, he made me shiver - especially that moment (I think at the start of Act III) where Otello is at the top of the stairs and you see Iago gradually come up behind him. So evil. He's wonderful.
I take your point about Dennis. He's obviously very committed and doing his best. But I'm afraid every time I see him, as powerful as his performance is, he just convinces me a little less.
Very happy it lived up to (and perhaps exceeded?) your expectations. I don't suppose that was you I saw outside the stage door with programme & pen at the ready?

[David]

No was not I