Conducted by
Noel Davis
Original director
David McVicar
Revival
directed by
Elaine Tyler-Hall
Designed by
Michael Vale
Cast
Tosca
Claire Rutter
Cavaradossi
Julian Gavin
Scarpia
Stephen Kechulius
Angelotti
D'Arcy Bleiker
Sacristan
Graeme Danby
Spoletta
Wynne Evans
Sciarrone
Karl Daymond
Gaoler
Christopher Ross
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Tosca
by Giacomo Puccini
English National Opera
London Coliseum
5 March - 15 April 2004
However well one knows Puccini's Tosca, the beauty of its music and the simple but endlessly fresh story that soars on that musics wings makes every re-encounter feel like the first. It is hard to imagine any professional opera company failing to please an audience with Tosca, and given the habitual warmth and sincerity of the ENO's characteristic manner, any Tosca it offers must delight. And this one certainly does: a full, rich, mellifluous handling of the score by the orchestra, and the casts spirited performances which were, in the best sense, theatrical as well as operatic, ensured the result.
The overall treatment was classic: no innovations or tricks, no updating or elicitation of unsuspected readings: it was pure, straight forward Tosca, exactly as it might have been seen at its Roman premiere over a century ago. This is not to imply that new treatments of classics are unwelcome; far from it; every living work of art merits the inventiveness of new directors and casts. But it is also a refreshment to touch base at times, especially when nothing really needs to be added to music so emotionally speaking, and a story so utterly and unequivocally direct, as in Puccini's version.
If there was anyone in this sound and talented cast who stood out, it was Stephen Kechulius as Scarpia. He is as if made for the part, conveying all the menace and lust, the cruelty and calculation, that the part requires, and singing it in an unobtrusively fine voice itself fitted as a glove to the character. Claire Rutter as Tosca is a very good actress, with an excellent sense of timing: her finding the knife, her hesitation before placing the candles and the crucifix at Scarpia's corpse, were perfect. Julian Gavin has a pleasing voice, which held itself well in the passionate reaches of the music. It was notable that Amanda Holden's English version of the text worked extremely well throughout, and best of all where it mattered most, in the great arias of the second and third acts.
AC Grayling
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