Page 549 - Media Coverage Book - 75th Aldeburgh Festival 2024

sing? This world-class British baritone, after decades on the opera stages of
the world, knows the power of stillness. His comedic restraint – as the
smug Baron set on saving his Pontevedrian homeland from bankruptcy –
was the steadying force in a big-hearted, hyperactive new staging of Franz
Léhar’s operetta which opened at the East Sussex festival last weekend.

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Thomas Allen (left) with Tom Edden backstage at Glyndebourne. Photograph:
David Levene/The Guardian

The action is rooted firmly in the pre-great war Edwardian period of its
composition. Old habits remain sacrosanct, and men hold the keys of power
except, it turns out, where money is concerned. Hanna Glawari, the sassy
widow of the title (a role that feels tailor-made for the night’s star, the
soprano Danielle de Niese), is now an heiress whose fortune could save
Pontevedro. Her widow’s weeds are off-the-shoulder and low-cut. She can
scarcely wait to end her year of mourning, lift her skirts and dance. A
natural stage animal, De Niese is magnetic, witty and brave (she injured her
leg at the start of the rehearsal period, but there was no sign). Her voice
may have lost some of its gloss but her commitment and musicality win out.
The Mexican baritone Germán Olvera as her love interest, Count Danilo,
was impressively acrobatic, as well as golden-voiced. Michael McDermott,
in a striking house debut, captured the obsessive love of Rosillon for the
married Valencienne, sung by the ever-engaging Soraya Mafi. Cameo roles
were well taken.

Gary McCann’s designs, with an eye to the belle époque via 1950s cinema,
are stupendous (lighting by Ben Cracknell, choreography by Carrie-Anne
Ingrouille). Versatile in film, theatre and circus as well as opera, McCrystal,
whose Iolanthe was a recent hit at English National Opera, pours his
versatility into this staging and no point asking for less. No good gag is not