I always think of this operetta as a show for the end of the year. The action is set on New Year’s Eve, and so producers often take that literally and place it at the far end of Christmas when we are surfeited with food and drink and supersaturated with celebrations. For an evening that celebrates champagne, joie de vivre and the giddy pursuit of frivolity to keep melancholy at bay, this is deeply unfair and unflattering. It is therefore a delight that the new and scintillating production at the Grange Festival puts all the bubbles back in their rightful place, at the heart of summer on apparently endless evenings and in seductively lengthening shadows.
Under Paul Daniel’s incisive and supple lead, the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra gave a fleet performance of the overture with finely graded dynamics anticipating the poise and finesse to come. Then we were whisked off to the plush apartment of the Eisensteins, set in 1920s Vienna this time, the first of three wonderful sets by Gary McCann, for the beginning of Dr Falke’s intricate pattern of revenge. This was succeeded by a reworking of the same hemicycle as Prince Orlovsky’s palace, regularly transformed by Johanna Town’s inventive lighting palate, and the exceptional costumes by Gabriella Ingram – deliciously luxurious and louche, whether in leather or feather. The final act offered a radical simplification of the set for the jail, but with the plenty of levels on which the denouement could play out.
The singing was exceptional throughout, whatever the national styles and vocal pyrotechnics required. Sylvia Schwartz, as Rosalinde, was both charming and daring in equal measure, and fully up to the challenge of the Csárdás in Act 2. As Adele, the maid with thespian aspirations, Ellie Laugharne was appropriately pert and provocative, nailing the stratospheric top notes demanded with ease. Claudia Huckle gave Orlovsky the right blend of aloof hauteur and sybaritic glee, while driving home the operetta’s central theme of ‘chacun à son goût.’ All the men were equally reliable performers, with Andrew Hamilton more goofy and gormless than sly and conniving as Eisenstein, and Ben McAteer’s suavity making you wish that Falke had more than one aria in this work. There was some impressive slapstick from Darren Jeffery as Frank, especially in his drunken scene in the final act, and the excellent Trystan LlÅ·r Griffiths made you want to hear him in all the Italian tenor roles from which he quoted. The ever reliable John Graham Hall contributed a pointed and telling cameo as the tiresome lawyer, Dr Blind.
Paul Daniel in the pit had the measure of the piece, supporting the singers where needed, and judging perfectly the points where a little rubato and a pointed hesitation best punctuated the numbers. This is very familiar music, of course, but it did not seem so in this performance where delightful instrumental solos bubbled up through the frothy textures and the excellent percussion section were precision personified when they needed to shine.
It was someone’s inspired idea to invite drag queen Myra DuBois to start the final act in the speaking role of the jailer, (here-Mme) Frosch. She flattened the fourth wall in a sentence and judging from the hilarity in the pit most of the material was clearly freshly improvised. It is never a good idea to sit in the front row in a drag show, and certainly the elderly gentleman sitting there with a straw hat in his lap will never forget this particular evening…
Everything whirled to its inevitable joyous resolution, and everyone headed home in the twilight sharing the universal champagne moment.
Music Johan Strauss II
Libretto: Carl Haffner & Richard Genée
Director: Paul Curran
Conductor: Paul Daniel
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra
Cast includes: Myra DuBois, Trystan LlÅ·r Griffiths, John Graham Hall, Andrew Hamilton, Claudia Huckle, Darren Jeffery, Ellie Laugharne, Ben McAteer, Sylvia Schwartz.
Until July 5 2025
4 hrs 10 mins with two intervals
Photo Credit: Richard Hubert Smith