Ellen Kent's Opera International, New Theatre Oxford, 2 March 2006.

For Rigoletto, Ellen Kent had assembled a cast that would grace the stage of the Royal Opera House. It was led by the doyen of the Chisinau Opera, Vladimir Dragos, whose talents are becoming familiar to followers of this Company. In voice and gesture he gave a great old-fashioned melodramatic performance of the title role. Gilda was sung in Oxford by another soprano of outstanding quality– Maria Tonina, her Caro Nome meriting a very high mark. In the final ensemble their voices were well matched by those of Andriy Perfilov as the Duke of Mantua and Tatiana Virlan, Madalena. Perfilov gave a good account of the role but, as always, suffered the handicap of having to compete, in his excerpt arias, with our memories of recordings of all the world’s greatest tenors of the last century! There were no weak links in the cast with notable portrayals of Monterone (Viorel Zgardan), Giovanna (Roddica Picireanu) and Sparafucile (Dmytro Pavlyuk).

In the advance publicity we were asked to note ‘some scenes contain nudity’ and that the production featured ‘a magnificent golden eagle’. (Such gimmicks are a trademark of Ellen Kent productions.) The latter made a dignified appearance in the first scene, while the naked and semi-naked ladies added an extra spice of debauchery to the Court of the Duke of Mantua in Acts I and II, though by the end of Act II they had rather exhausted their repertoire of seductive wiles! The whole staging was fast-paced and exciting, transitional scenes being enacted before a black proscenium curtain, without any interruption. The only slight weakness was the rather inflexible conductor’s beat, preventing the orchestral accompaniment from making a full impact. But this was a major triumph by any standard! One looks forward to the new production of Die Fledermaus due in Oxford on 14 September,

As drama, these two operas are contrasted in the universality of their plots. La Bohème is firmly anchored to a time and place where young women died of consumption in unheated garrets. The story of Rigoletto, on the other hand could be set in any time in history from Ancient Rome to the present day where similar macho elements of society exist (fun-loving or depraved, according to one’s point of view). Indeed, Jonathan Miller’s renowned mafioso version is having yet another revival ay ENO. A recent episode of Footballers’ Wives (viewed inadvertently, I assure you) had a poolside party strangely reminiscent of Ellen Kent’s Act I. A version of Rigoletto set in the world of professional football could well pull in a new audience for opera. If that’s what you want.