David Gyger
Opera
Problem month for AO: Seymour and UNSW successes After the long string of early season triumphs reported previously in these columns, it was possibly only to be expected that the Australian Opera would falter a little during September — and so it did. No new productions were premiered during the month, only revivals of La Boheme and that old warhorse of a double bill, Mascagni’s Cavalleria Rusticana and Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci. Neither opening night was anything like an unequivocal success; and things, in the case of La Boheme at least, were destined to get a good deal worse before they got better. This year’s AO Mimi, Leona Mitchell, copped an unwarranted share of the blame in some critical quarters for the failure of this series of Bohemes to succeed dramatically at opening. No doubt her performance improved as the production settled in, along with everyone else’s; but she was far from solely responsible for the shortcomings of the first night. Fqt much of the evening her Rodolfo, Lamberto Furlan, seemed more interested in what was going on in the third row of the dress circle than in her failing health which must be, after all, a focal point of any thoroughly successful Boheme. The
horseplay among the bohemians, a vital foil to the serious side of the piece, barely convinced in the first act and not at all in Act IV, where it is even more important dramatically. Things were not helped by the fact that Alan Light’s Alcindoro was not in good voice, an indisposition which clearly muted Etela Piha’s Musetta. Before I returned to a matinee of La Boheme on September 23, both Furlan and the scheduled Marcello for the entire season, John Pringle, had been temporarily floored by illness. Pringle was recovered by the matinee, as was Light; and Anson Austin, finished by this stage with his thoroughly successful series of Alfredos in La Traviata, was playing Rodolfo to great effect. He still has some way to go before he could be deemed a thoroughly relaxed actor, but he was certainly conveying the impression on this occasion that he cared about Mimi; and he was relating to the other bohemians; and he was singing very well indeed. This year’s conductor, Mark Elder, clearly did not have enough rehearsal time before opening to get Boheme to the level of excellence he would have liked, and there were musical flaws
Etela Piha (Musettal in the AO’s La Boheme. 52
T H E A T R E A U ST R A L IA N O V EM BE R 1978
then which had been ironed out thoroughly by my second visit. It is to be hoped this talented young Englishman, who cut his opera conducting teeth in Australia a few years ago as a protege of Edward Downes, can be attracted back to Australia regularly over the next few years, for there is no doubt he is an extremely positive influence on the standards of the Australian Opera. The revivals of Cavalleria Rusticana and Pagliacci, under the direction of Bernd Benthaak were plagued by illness and uncertainty in the rehearsal period, particularly in the tenor department where Robin Donald and his father, Donald Smith, were scheduled to share the limelight. Donald did sing at a special pre-premiere performance, but was struck down between then and the official first night, forcing Reginald Byers to fill in on very short notice the night after filling in for Lamberto Furlan as Rodolfo in La Boheme. One must sympathise with him for having to perform two such major roles on consecutive nights when he had not been scheduled to sing either this year, and in the event he only managed to get through them with
Photo: William Moseley