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OPERA REVIEW
January 28, 2006
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By Michael Zwiebach
Berkeley Opera is well known around the Bay Area for carefully prepared
productions that are strong in musical and dramatic detail, and Verdi's
Falstaff, their latest offering, is no exception to that rule. While the
production, which opened on Saturday night at the Julia Morgan Theater,
did not boast any superlative performances, the fine ensemble cast was
musically cohesive thanks, in no small part, to the wizardry of
long-time artistic director Jonathan Khuner. For Falstaff lovers (which
is another way of saying "practically everybody"), this show will be a
pleasant midwinter treat.
Promotional material promised plenty of slapstick "shenanigans," and to
that end Amos Glick of the San Francisco Mime Troupe was hired to assist
in the staging of the show. (He is listed in the program as "Acting and
Comedy Director.") Unfortunately, there isn't much in the way of
physical comedy that can easily coexist with the physical demands of
good singing. The laughs are pretty much confined to big moments, like
the Act II finale when Falstaff is stuffed into a laundry basket and
then dumped out a window into the Thames. Glick did develop a credible
relationship between Bardolph (Mark Hernandez) and Pistola (Isaiah
Musik-Ayala), playing off Hernandez' lively, robust personality against
the saturnine Musik-Ayala. But much else was standard comic fare, such
as Ford's intemperate entrance in which he goes to strangle Falstaff,
slipping suddenly into his "Fontana" character as Falstaff turns to him.
What follows, as Ford administers several slaps in the guise of
heartiness, was one of the few moments of true slapstick in the show.
Cute, but hardly hilarious.
The production was on much stronger ground when it came to comic
characterization. Khuner has a strong sense for Shakespeare and he and
the rest of his directing team (Jason Sherbundy and Glick) have
emphasized the recognizable humanity of the characters, even here in a
broad farce. Khuner aimed at a complete portrait of Falstaff, "his love
of refinement contrasted with his relish of vulgarity . . . his
appreciation for nobility contrasted with his dependence on lowlifes,"
as he put it in a program note.
The eminently directable Jo Vincent Parks was remarkably true to Khuner's concept and gave one of his best dramatic performances in this role. His reactions were specific, and he managed to rouse some sympathy in the audience. For example, his frozen call to the innkeeper for hot wine, after he has dragged himself from the Thames, sets up the whole second half of his solo ("Versiamo un po' di vino ..." — Let us mix a little wine into the water of the Thames.). You could easily believe at that moment that he has never better enjoyed a glass of wine. Later in the same scene he screwed up a double-take, but you can't have everything. As a singer, Park's advantages in this role are his clear diction and his comfort with rapid-fire dialogue in Italian. His large voice, with a rumbling vibrato, is perfect for Sir John's coarser moments. He had a few pitch problems in the first scene but by and large he was on top of his game. And his occasional slips might be explained by the fact that he was actually replacing a previously announced singer (Donald Sherrill) who had withdrawn. Falstaff's primary object of desire, Alice Ford, was played by Jillian Khuner. The voice has lost some of its magic at the ends of the register: The upper notes sounded a little stretched and the low ones were uncertain in intonation. Nevertheless, her artistry is irreplaceable and singing is still second nature to her: She never seems to exert effort. Her diction and phrasing are impeccable, and she handled the comedy, never her forte, fluidly. Whatever the current limitations of her voice, she is still an intelligent and resourceful performer.
Igor Vieira, as Ford, had the best male voice in the cast, strong and resonant, in keeping with Ford's overbearing character. He phrased well and his showpiece aria, ("O sogno . . . o realtà?" — Is it a dream or reality?) was one of the vocal highpoints of the show. Alice's comrades in temptation, Katherine Growden (Meg Page) and Donna Olson (Mistress Quickly), were sure-footed singers. Olson was a highly mannered actress who often telegraphed a coming line, with the result that many of her entrances seemed mistimed even when they weren't. Andrew Truett was an appealing Fenton, although his soft lyric tenor was challenged by his Act IV aria. His upper register is open, but there are signs of effort, and his phrasing up there is not really free. As Nannetta, the other half of the loving couple, Ann Moss had quite a fine voice, singing with pure, luminous tone in her Act IV Queen of the Fairies solo. Once again, Jonathan Khuner deserves the greatest praise for his consummate artistry and musicianship. He doesn't make it easy on himself either: Falstaff is a thicket of complexly interwoven strands of rhythm, vocal and instrumental. Yes, there were a few dropped cues and a couple of early entrances; but on the whole, the ensemble cohesion was very good. You could see the concentration on some faces as the final fugal chorus took flight, but there were no mishaps. The Act I finale, with its mixing of 4/4 and 6/8 meters and its mélange of words, was put over theatrically and without tentativeness. For that, Khuner and his co-music director, Jason Sherbundy, can take justifiable pride. Along with his traffic direction, Kuhner developed a well-rounded reading of the score, balancing the carnivalesque elements with well-phrased lyricism and pulling precise rhythms from the orchestra. The orchestral sound was intrusive only in the highest violin passages, such as the end of Act I and the opening measures of Nannetta's fairy music. There was some room for improvement, but doubtless Khuner will make adjustments to details before the next performance. He stretches his forces, but somehow they always respond satisfactorily.
(Michael Zwiebach holds a Ph.D. in music history from UC Berkeley and lectures on music history at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.)
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