the crazy house
by Douglas Messerli
Gioachino Rossini (composer), Cesare
Sterbini (Libretto, based on the play by Pierre Beaumarchais), Bartlett Sher
(stage director), Gary Halvorson (film director) Il barbiere di siviglia, ossia L'inutile precauzione (The Barber of Seville, or The Useless
Precaution) / 2007 [the Metropolitan Opera HD-live broadcast]
The great Peruvian tenor Juan Diego Flórez, sometimes described as Pavarotti's heir, who performed Count Almaviva in the Met production of The Barber of Seville Howard and I recently saw is also known also for his performances in La Fille du Régiment, one of Pavarotti's greatest achievements.
Accordingly, it seems appropriate that I briefly discuss the
Metropolitan Opera's wonderful production of The Barber, whose overall production values, overseen by Bartlett
Sher, and brilliant operatic performances by Joyce DiDonato as Rosina, Peter
Mattei as Figaro, John Del Carlo as Dr. Bartolo, John Relyea as Don Basilio,
Claudia Waite as Berta, and, particularly, Flórez as the Count (whose "Ah! qual colpo inaspettato!" nearly
stopped the opera with audience applause) were memorable.
The story of The Barber of Seville, as most opera-goers know, is a simple one,
the kind of contrived plot behind hundreds of 17th and 18th century farces.
Count Almaviva, having espied Rosina in the streets, has fallen in love and
followed her to Seville, where he disguises himself as a poor student, Lindoro.
Rosina is equally in love with the young man, but is locked away in the house
of her guardian, Dr. Bartolo, advised by the musician Basilio, who warns him of
the Count's love for Bartolo's ward. Hearing of the Count's interest and the arrival
in Seville of a young man, Bartolo tightens the young girl's security, since he
himself intends to marry her.
Figaro, the local barber who has entry to
all homes and—so it appears—hearts, is an old friend of the Count, and plots
with him how the Count might enter Bartolo's house. He will disguise himself
yet again, this time as a drunken soldier, ordered to be billeted in Bartolo's
home. When that ends in chaos and failure, the Count visits the house as a
disciple of Don Basilio to teach Rosina a music lesson, plotting with her their
escape that night.
The rest of the story predictably involves
around a number of temporary setbacks and detours, but ends in the joyful
marriage of Rosina to the Count with a nod to Figaro's necessary help, although
by opera's end it does almost seem that if the Count had simply appeared as
himself in the beginning he might more easily have won Rosina's hand, as if, as
the subtitle suggests, all his precautions were useless. But then, of course,
there would have been no occasion around which to weave Rossini's joyous arias!
Aspects of this plot have been employed
in so many instances that it may sound to the reader than I am describing
another opera or play. The flaxen-haired ward of Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd, Lucy, a young girl also
held against her will, whom the lecherous Judge intends to marry, quickly
springs to mind.
What makes Rossini's version refreshing,
however, is the heady willfulness of his heroine, who from the first scene is
determined to get the man she wants and is so artful in her quick-witted lies
that the audience gasps as she nearly outfoxes her suspicious guardian. In Act
II, when Bartolo suggests the letter of love he possesses was sent by the count
to another woman, so strong is Rosina's sense of vengeance that she is willing
to destroy her own life by marrying the old coot. In short, we can only feel a
comic delight when the Count sings of the pains and sorrows the poor, innocent
girl has had to suffer; for the woman with whom he will awake in the morning
is, in fact, another being than the one of which he sings. There is, indeed, a
kind of madness in his love.
Los Angeles, September 26, 2007
Reprinted
from Green Integer Blog (August
2009).
