Page 548 - Media Coverage Book - 75th Aldeburgh Festival 2024
P. 548
16 June 2024
The week in classical: The Merry
Widow; Aldeburgh festival – review
Glyndebourne, East Sussex; Snape Maltings, Suffolk
Thomas Allen steals a witty, sparkling new production of Léhar’s
masterpiece, and a cosmic world premiere from Judith Weir lives up to her
star billing
Fiona Maddocks
All eyes were on Thomas Allen. Not that there was no other attraction. On
the contrary, every inch of the stage in Glyndebourne’s The Merry
Widow (1905), magisterially conducted by John Wilson and maximally
directed by Cal McCrystal, teemed with visual glory: a sweeping,
Hollywood-style staircase down whose banister the inebriated hero, Danilo,
could make his entry, sliding from top to bottom and hic-c-ing all the way; a
throng of silk bustles and net ruffles in bold stripes or sherbet colours, as
gorgeous as any herbaceous border in June; oversize, Dior-style hats worn
at a saucy tilt; sexy grisettes with high kicks and black stockings; fit,
dandyish men in tight suits, luxuriant moustaches styled à la Marcel Proust.
Why, then, amid all this spectacle, be transfixed by Allen, a septuagenarian
with a stage totter, apparently recalcitrant dancing feet and not much to
