O fortunata nata me consule Roma

London
Coliseum
11/18/00 -
Giochino Rossini <I>The Turk in Italy</I>

Thomas Allen (Prosdocimo), Judith Howarth (Fiorilla), Donald Maxwell
(Geronio), Victoria Simmonds (Zaida), Jeremy White (Selim), Toby Spence
(Narciso), Ryland Davies (Albazar)

ENO Orchestra and Chorus
Dominic Wheeler (conductor), David Fielding (director)


The women‘s chorus in act one of the ENO production of <I>The Turk in
Italy</I> look a lot like the poultry in <I>Chicken run</I>. They are
heavily pear-shaped in their movie-musical outfits and have feathers on
their heads. It’s difficult to say whether this production is an exercise
in creative exotic bad taste or a complete turkey. On a first attempt to
see it, your correspondent went to sleep during the first act, at least
partly because of jet lag and emotional trauma, but not necessarily
entirely. A second viewing of the last performance of the complete work (on
18 November) didn’t really add much enlightenment.

The idea of treating Rossini’s “putting on an opera” opera as an avatar of
Pirandello and Fellini is defensible, a good one even, as there is
certainly something specifically Italian in that particular literary and
dramatic strand. And it’s an obvious temptation to use the Fellini
connection to introduce some contemporary Italian style and humour into the
season, since when modern Italian opera is represented by the grim (if
powerful) <I>Prisoner</I> of Dallapiccola. But somehow Rossini is more
interested in using the director’s manipulations to provide a context for
even greater vocal excess, not parody exactly, but expression heightened by
the fact that the characters are all themselves performers and artists.
Prosdocimo himself gets only one aria, because he cannot be out of control
for long otherwise the other characters will have no plot to justify their
scenes. (The aria is plausibly cut in this version though it would be good
to hear Thomas Allen singing it.) The fact that Fiorilla is Prosdocimo’s
former mistress is a lot less relevant than the fact that she is a prima
donna married to the producer, because that’s what affects the power play.
Fellini, in contrast, is overwhelmingly worried about sex, and the
extremely loaded characteristics of the sexes, matters that are at most
simple tokens and types for Rossini.

But the Fellini set-up, if not enough to justify the production, is quite
amusing in itself. There are strips of film draped around the scaffolding
in the Coliseum, left there for <I>La Boh&egrave;me</I>, for no obvious
reason, and for <I>La strada</I>. The Venetian maskers are still lurking,
and a Roman statue from <I>Poppea</I> stands in front of a box, a reminder,
presumably, that we are still in Roma and headed for another catfight
between divas. Prosdocimo’s move is called <I>Italia!</I> and he wears
glasses like Marcello Mastroianni in <I>8 1/2</I>, as do the male chorus.
There are too many film and opera gags to note, and some of them are funny,
but the whole thing doesn’t really deliver a particular mood -- panic or
wry detachment -- or commentary. In addition, the focus on the gags makes
the development rather fragmentary. You can understand Prosdocimo’s
breakdown, as very little makes sense, but the action isn’t engaging enough
to share his anxiety.

The ENO orchestra play the music with humour, and a touch of amusing
vulgarity. The singers are all pretty good, as far as they can be. Judith
Howarth as Fiorilla doesn’t have the sweetest coloratura you ever heard,
but she did her final scena -- when she thinks her producer husband is
going to divorce her and is putting on a show to win him back -- with
incredible style and passion. Victoria Simmonds, a member of the ENO’s new
Jerwood programme for young singers, was impressive as Zaida, hard edged as
a character and vocally smooth. Donald Maxwell was an old smoothy as
Geronio, Ryland Davies was understatedly camp as Albazar and Toby Spence
was suitably lightweight as Narciso, Fiorilla’s ex-leading man and lover.
They were all quite funny. Jeremy White was amazingly dull and unsexy as
the Turk, Selim, compared to Omar Sharif, but in fact less interesting than
White in his normal concert persona. Thomas Allen as Prosdocimo provided a
stylish focus for the opera, but couldn’t quite rescue the production.


H.E. Elsom