Most of the audience was going wild for the production and I was surprised at what I was seeing and hearing.  Now, the music was wonderful, truly wonderful and I loved Luisi’s conducting.  The orchestra was the best I have heard this season.  And the lighting was great.  It effectively set the mood and definitely enhanced the scenes.  I hope we see much more of Adam Silverman at the Met.

 

Beyond that, however, I was confused as to why the audience was so enthralled with this production.  I was excited to see Sondra Radvanovsky as I had heard great things about her, but she did not seem to be 100%.  Perhaps she had a cold?  Hopefully she feels better soon.  I could hardly hear Oscar at points, and was sitting in orchestra prime seats, and why was he smoking in this production?  Isn’t Oscar supposed to be a page, a young teen at best?  He’s too young to be smoking.  Or have a goatee. 

I appreciate the attempt to update and modernize productions—I loved Macbeth last year—but not when they’re seemingly directed by Benny Hill.  There were waiters in tuxedos doing the can-can in Act I.  Even the principals got in on the can-can.  I could not help but giggle even in moments when the music was riveting.  The staging completely and consistently took me out of the moment.  All the while the bulk of the audience was applauding madly and shouting bravo.  Again I felt like I had slipped through a crack in the fabric of space-time and into The Twilight Zone.

I found it hard to take seriously the sea of glowing mustard green Gorton’s fishermen swaying in unison in Act I.  These guys looked totally benign, not like someone I would run into on the docks of a port.   It was just weird.  Seeing a stage full of Gorton’s fishermen did make me hungry, though.  So as usual, sucker that I am, I sprung for the damn $16 salmon sandwich at intermission.

Standing at the milk and sugar island downstairs during intermission I gazed quixotically at the throngs of operagoers, trying to fathom their seeming enthusiasm for the production.  I must admit I felt a bit redeemed when I heard one audience member exclaim to her companion “I just love the French in this opera!”  Later when we returned to our seats, we asked the sweet elderly couple sitting to our left how they were enjoying the opera.  The woman turned to my fiancé and smiled and said, “This is just awful.”  Apparently the poor folks had come all the way from Boston, even rented a hotel room, just to see Ballo.  They have been going to the opera for over 50 years. 

I liked the use of the mural of Icarus (I am assuming it was Icarus); although I don’t know how thematically consistent Icarus is with the action of Ballo.  Macbeth is the ultimate “over-reacher” in my estimation. 

I liked Hvorostovsky’s singing very much in Renato’s Act III studio apartment, he certainly has great gravitas, but later I was greatly distracted by the co-conspirator’s frenetic defacing of the tenor’s portrait.  I was afraid he would turn the portrait around to reveal he had painted a mustache and glasses on it.  Or maybe a blacked-out tooth or horns.   Sadly, my hunch wasn’t far off.

The last act set and staging was effective, I guess.  The costumes sure were gorgeous in the final scene, highlighted by Silverman’s aquatic lighting dancing across the stage.  Overall, I was left with the feeling that I desperately need to see a standard period production of Ballo.  Do they even do those anymore?