DON CARLO • COPENHAGEN
★★★★★★
Photo: Miklos Szabo
DON CARLO REVIEW: SUPERIOR CAST IN FURIOUSLY BEAUTIFUL STAGE DESIGN
Italian director Davide Livermore has teamed up with video designers from Milan-based architecture and design studio Giò Forma to create a visual masterpiece that embraces Verdi’s operatic thriller Don Carlo about power and impossible love. A top-notch cast of singers makes the Opera’s season opener a must-see on an international level.
The stage design is carried by huge graphic animations that are some of the most beautiful video graphics I’ve seen in an opera house – and an artistic manifestation that could easily have been enjoyed on its own in leading museums of modern art.
Photo: Miklos Szabo
Historical, political and religious motifs mix in spectacular, fluctuating flows with Picasso, classic portraiture, documentary wartime footage and fabulous lighting in blood-red hues.
An all-dominant, striking video ambience that is skillfully infused with analogue materiality through the presence of gigantic, physical set pieces.
Quite simply a furiously beautiful stage design that surprises and impresses throughout the performance.
Don Carlo is a devastating love triangle in which fiery young love between the king’s son Don Carlos and his beloved Elisabeth must be sacrificed for a necessary forced marriage between Elisabeth and Carlos’ father King Philip, as part of peace negotiations between Spain and France during the Inquisition.
Reason and emotion are confronted in Verdi’s action-packed masterpiece, which is deftly pushed around in time but still boils with dramatic intensity.
Don Carlo is among Verdi’s most recent works (No. 25 of his 28 operas), and you meet a mature composer who shines with grandiose, orchestral music. At times, the full-grown soundscapes almost smack of Wagner, who you sometimes forget was around at around the same time.
Photo: Miklos Szabo
Oddly enough, the extemporized, power-political plot also contains a kind of liebestod in the myriad references to both Franco’s and Mussolini’s fascism. The gigantic projection of Picasso’s Guernica in the final scene, together with effective plot execution, makes for a dazzling finale that I won’t spoil.
Photo: Miklos Szabo
Stephen Milling, the Danish-born, internationally sought-after bass superstar is convincing to say the least as the tortured King Philip, tormented by the loneliness and duty of power. As the emotionally conflicted court lady Eboli, Azerbaijani mezzo AytajShikhalizada impresses, while Gisella Stille gives a fine performance as Elisabeth. Best of all is the Korean velour baritone Gihoon Kim as Rodrigo, who receives the biggest applause in the hall.
The orchestral playing is perhaps a bit uneven before the intermission – but it picks up clearly, so that the musical delivery also reaches the top on this sunny opening Sunday.
In short: Highly recommended performance in a very impressive, visual production with a high-quality cast of singers that scores six stars from GOT TO SEE THIS.
