SEMELE by George Frideric Handel (Canadian Opera Company). At the Four Seasons Centre (145 Queen West). To May 26, various dates (May 23 performance with members of the COC Ensemble). $12-$318 ensemble performance $22-$55. 416-363-8231. See Listing. Rating: NNNN
There’s lots to marvel at and a few puzzling and silly elements in director/set designer Zhang Huan’s take on Handel’s Semele, a story from classical Western mythology given a pan-Asian staging.
Semele (Jane Archibald), one of Jupiter’s (William Burden) many human lovers, is tricked by the god’s jealous wife, Juno (Allyson McHardy) – disguised as Semele’s sister Ino – into requesting immortality and having Jupiter show himself in his divine form. The revelation is too hot for her she’s turned to cinders when he appears.
Zhang puts the story, literally, into the frame of a 450-year-old Ming Dynasty temple that he salvaged and rebuilt. His inspiration for the production is partly the history of a couple who lived in the temple several decades ago, a history that involves lust and vengeance.
It’s a striking concept, often beautiful to watch and suited to the opera’s themes. But the staging clashes with Handel’s music and the characters’ feelings.
The problem is mostly in the first half, with a panto horse who appears in the first scene and later takes an active role in an orgy, and a pair of sumo wrestlers who take centre stage.
Happily, the second act’s staging, including an inflated character atop the temple and a white Chinese dragon, resonates with true drama.
Even in the moments when you roll your eyes at the action, the design – Han Feng’s costumes, both Eastern and Western, and Wolfgang Gobbel’s lighting – is always splendid.
The singing is also fine, as is most of the acting. Handel’s operas can be performed in a stand-and-deliver approach, but neither Zhang nor the performers fall into that trap. Archibald’s honeyed voice is beguiling, and she conveys Semele’s cravings – first innocent, then willful and monstrous – sharply. McHardy defines her imperious Juno and offended Ino, both driven by jealousy, with believable emotion and theatrical detail, while Katherine Whyte’s Iris, Juno’s messenger, makes a good comic sidekick for the queen of the gods.
Burden’s Jupiter is vocally impressive but dramatically bland there’s little sense that this god feels passion, and then regret, for the woman he desires.
Like McHardy, Steven Humes also tackles two roles: Semele’s royal father, Cadmus, and Somnus, the god of sleep. He has little to do but look regal as the former, but his Somnus is filled with little character quirks. Anthony Roth Costanzo’s Athamas, Semele’s bridegroom-to-be, uses his countertenor to good effect, but Zhang’s version cuts half his music.
In fact, the director’s focus changes the nature of the finale. Handel wrote 10 more minutes of music that we don’t hear from the pit and ended his work on a joyful note Zhang’s Semele concludes on a melancholy one that has its own beauty.
And as fascinating as is the film about the temple’s history, shown during the playing of the overture, we’re watching it rather than listening to Rinaldo Alessandrini’s expert conducting. Handel’s composition is better than a background film score.
The May 23 performance features members of the COC Ensemble.
