It was quite unexpected. The new production of Il trovatore currently showing at the Dutch National Opera is not the totally over-the-top affair for which La Fura dels Baus might have prepared us. For the Catalan theatre group’s standards, it is visually quite straightforward, albeit still monumental, and the action is simply transposed in time from medieval Spain to the trenches of World War I. Director Àlex Ollé has explained that he had not wanted to shy away from the dark drama of the original story line, which is so often ridiculed as unbelievable. In his opinion, the context of the horror of the Great War – or of any war – is enough to make one believe in a confused mother’s infanticide. The transposition works somehow, and the result is a dark, almost monochromatic staging that mirrors the oppressive darkness of the story.
The Great War is an occasion for costume designer Lluc Castells to make use of an interesting mix of old-world uniforms with more modern accessories but, visually, it is the monumental sets by Aldons Flores that dominate the spectacle. Large rectangular monoliths, several storeys high, occupy the stage. As the performance advances, their height is adjusted up and down by cables, or they are lifted up in the air disclosing gaping pits. Scene after scene, they move to depict the various settings of the action: battlefield trenches, tombstones of a graveyard, a peristyle of a convent or a cell inside a dungeon. At their best, those sets have a striking dramatic effect. “Condotta ell’era in ceppi”, Azucena’s narration of her mother’s death and her baby’s immolation, is staged in a chillingly effective manner: under a menacing stone ceiling, the ether thick with smoke and nightmarish gas-masked visions. However, those sets also considerably impair movement on stage and ensemble scenes often feel very static.
This can also have an upside: the staging never interferes with the singing and the Chorus of Dutch National Opera gave a particularly refined performance. I wish this refinement had been matched in the pit, but unfortunately conductor Maurizio Benini led the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra in a performance which too often felt run-of-the-mill.
The soloists, having to negotiate their way between stone monoliths, gaping holes and hanging cables, sometimes appeared left to themselves by rather unimaginative direction. This is unfortunate because vocally, they delivered. On the first night, all of them, down to the (not so) secondary roles of Ferrando (Roberto Tagliavini) and Ines (Florieke Beelen), gave stylish singing performances that greatly compensated for the shortcomings elsewhere. And after all, Il trovatore is a singers’ opera par excellence.