SEATTLE — What do you get when you dust off a centuries-old, long-neglected opera and give it everything you’ve got?
A hit, if the company is Seattle Opera and the opera is “Iphigenia in Tauris,” a hidden (to modern audiences) masterpiece by German composer Cristoph Gluck that opened last weekend. Musically and dramatically, this opera is a triumph.
“Iphigenia” was Gluck’s greatest opera when it premiered in Paris in 1779. It fell from favor over the decades and was rarely performed until recently. With its musical riches it’s a 21st century natural, but the dramatic challenges — pumping life into an ancient story — are many.
In “Iphigenia,” based on a classic Greek drama by Euripides, Agamemnon’s eldest daughter is saved by the goddess Diana from death at her father’s hands. A priestess held against her will in Tauris, Iphigenia is commanded to kill two Greeks who have been captured. She discovers that one is her brother, saves both their lives and returns with them to Greece.
Seattle Opera’s “Iphigenia” offers a superb cast and orchestra and inspired staging that infuses this very ancient story with sensuous emotion and wrenching drama.
It’s also a first-ever co-production with New York’s Metropolitan Opera, and for this important assignment Seattle assembled an A-list production team with direction by Stephen Wadsworth, set design by Thomas Lynch and costumes by Martin Pakledinaz, the award-winning team that produced Seattle Opera’s most-recent Ring Cycle. The set and costumes were made here.
Seattle can be proud of this glistening production, which opens in New York after its Seattle run with Wadsworth at the helm but with a different cast. Who needs New York when you’ve got singers like these in Seattle?
Nuccia Focile, a gifted actress who sings the title role (alternating with Marie Plette), gives a superb performance as the tormented priestess. The petite soprano has a very big voice that is supple throughout the range and blooms beautifully at the top. Her phrasing is impeccable and voice projection is a marvel.
The caliber of her performance is matched note for note by baritone Brett Polegato as Orestes and tenor William Burden as Pylades, two Seattle Opera veterans whose second-act duet is among the most beautiful sustained passages of singing I have ever heard on the Seattle Opera stage.
Welsh baritone Phillip Joll, who appeared as Wotan in Seattle Opera’s 2001 Ring, sings the role of the evil king Thoas with force and menace, and Canadian mezzo-soprano Michele Losier is a dazzling Diana in her Seattle Opera debut. The supporting performers — Ani Maldjian, Leena Chopra and David Adam Moore — and the Seattle Opera Chorus are excellent.
Much of the credit for this opera’s success must go to Gary Thor Wedow, whose elegant conducting breathes such life into the score, the music flowing seamlessly from recitative to aria. The same credit is due Wadsworth, whose staging flows naturally from the dramatic story. He brings an ancient story to living, breathing, blood-flowing life, enhanced by a few bits of stage-craft wizardry that are “gee-whiz” fun without overwhelming.
The massive set by Lynch nearly overwhelms the stage. It’s divided into sections — the dark, red-hued Temple of Diana dominates — with an anteroom that doubles as a prison space and waiting area and a smaller space open to the sky. Pakledinaz’s austere costumes reflect the dark nature of this opera.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
