Review: Vancouver Opera's Don Pasquale takes an entertaining trip to stylized retro Rome
Flowing bel canto music meets a production full of comedic stage business, side characters, and cat figurines
Colourful characters populate Vancouver Opera’s Don Pasquale. Photo by Emily Cooper
Don Pasquale continues at the Queen Elizabeth Theatre on February 15 and 18
GAETANO DONIZETTI’S DON PASQUALE tells a simple, frothy story of an old buffoon bent on marrying a much younger woman—and her pulling one over on him. But that’s only a sliver of everything that’s going on in Vancouver Opera’s inventively stylized production by André Barbe and Renaud Doucet.
In their setting of a 1960s Roman pensione, there’s the washerwoman with the cigarette sutured to her bottom lip, hoisting lines of sheets as scenes shift, or craning her head through doorways to hear the gossip going on at centre stage. Or the ancient bellman who shuffles around the lobby, perpetually struggling to stay awake and entirely unable to lift guests’ suitcases.
And then there’s the set: the wonky Trastevere-like courtyard that opens up to a roof deck where guests eat their breakfasts. And the faded, terra-cotta-hued pensione foyer that its owner, Don Pasquale, has scattered with fluorescent-green cat figurines—because he’s allergic to the real thing. We learn that, and other background, from the opening’s flip-through of a projected Fotoromanza comic-book.
In short, design-director-duo Barbe and Doucet find ways to stage the 1843 comedy—rarely performed here—that only add to the entertainment of its sparkling music. None of it feels forced; the exaggerated setting fits this mid-19th-century opera buffa (also originally set in Rome) surprisingly well.
This is not an opera that has a smash-hit showstopper; instead, it’s full of flowing recitatives, meringue-light vocal acrobatics, and arias and duets for every mood. It helps that the VO has assembled a cast of talented comedic actors—who also happen to be serious bel canto singers.
What feels most modern about this production is the way the young widow Norina wields her power, refusing to comply with the demands of the older Don Pasquale (Gregory Dahl, in an intriguing play against type). She and her uncle Dr. Malatesta conspire to trick Pasquale into a fake marriage; Norina is actually in love with the nephew he’s just kicked out (but Pasquale disapproves of their relationship).
This is no naive ingenue, and Canadian soprano Elizabeth Polese revels in the role. Knowing the old man loves cats, Norina playfully takes on feline mannerisms. Once the marriage certificate is in hand, she makes his life miserable—and sets about spending all his money. Hilariously, this includes a loud op-art redesign of his tired pensione.
Polese finds all the colours in Norina’s role—lovelorn girl, faux-demure fiancée, conniving vixen, and fearless dragon. You believe her when she sings “I know every trick in the book,” and her buoyant, seemingly effortless coloratura runs fit the production well.
Don Pasquale’s Colleen Winto and Elizabeth Polese. Photo by Emily Cooper
She’s matched by the two charismatic young men—baritone Phillip Addis’s Dr. Malatesta and tenor Josh Lovell’s Ernesto. Lovell pulls out two gorgeous, mellifluous arias—“Chercherò lontana terra”, and the serenade “Com’è gentil”, and these two dapper tizios share a lovely late duet. They bring depth and character to the Fawlty Towers silliness. Dahl, better known here for sinister turns like last fall’s Flying Dutchman, has fun playing the frustrated fool—shaking his fists and raising his bushy grey eyebrows at his wife’s shopping sprees—but grounding it in a man who’s raging against age.
Those obsessed with the La Dolce Vita era will appreciate how Barbe and Doucet take the midcentury Roman details to the nth degree—with costumes including Mastroianni-style black-framed glasses and era-perfect capris and hats. And check out those ‘60s-space-age lounge chairs.
Vancouver Opera’s music director Jacques Lacombe brings precision and just the right light touch to the orchestra—polishing the gloss on Donizetti’s score.
So it’s easy on the ears, and, as you watch the set’s sky turn from bright sun to pinky-purple dusk over the crooked TV antennas, lights glowing in all the apartment windows, this Don Pasquale more than pleases the eyes, too. We can’t promise the production will tax your brain too much; it’s a foregone conclusion that the younger generation will triumph over the older one. But there’s a lot to like about a trip to groovy retro Rome in the middle of damp Vancouver February.
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