Apparently this modernist
production drew a few audible gasps
when it was unveiled at the Berlin Opera
a couple of years ago. I’m not sure
why. German houses are known for being
adventurous and, in any case, this is
not the first time Mozart has had this
treatment, Peter Sellars and Jonathan
Miller springing to mind as previous
iconoclastic directors.
Certainly TV and film
director Doris Dörrie, here making
her opera debut, goes for broke with
her approach. She sets the action in
the early 1970s, when the hippie Flower
Power revolution was in full swing.
As the booklet makes clear, she is not
an opera buff, generally finding the
few productions she had seen ‘pretty
dry and dusty’. She is also quoted as
believing the Cosi plot to be
‘a Hollywood-style melodrama’ and was
obviously determined to make the most
of the comic elements, using as her
general motto "‘Cheat on your partner
or not’, that is the question".
The end result has
some things going for it, but ultimately
one is left with the feeling that a
dimension has been missed. Setting the
whole thing as a hippie musical, which
looks overall somewhere between Hair
and Jesus Christ Superstar, does indeed
open up aspects of the moral dimension
in this work. As Dörrie says ‘It
was a time of rebellion against outmoded
morality … conventions were being eroded
and those who were brave enough broke
out into freedom’. Of course, it also
means that some of the inevitable anachronisms
jar somewhat. We first meet the three
male protagonists in a bustling airport
lounge, wearing sharp Armani suits and
emerging as early yuppies as they make
their ‘hundred grand’ bet on the faithfulness
of their partners. The next scene is
then hard to take, as they have to tell
their fiancés that they have
been ‘called to war’ (where – Vietnam,
perhaps?). It is admittedly hilarious
when they then come back disguised as
something out of Easy Rider, with hair
down to the waist, sideburns and Frank
Zappa moustaches. But the crucial role
of the maid is also hard to take in
this context (would these girls really
have a maid?) and certain scenes, such
as when the hippie commune gather for
a pot smoking love-in, are funny but
seem to trivialise the deeper emotions
at work in Mozart’s plot.
It is very well performed.
All the singers are on good form, and
work well together in this most ensemble-based
of Mozart operas. If I have a casting
quibble, it is the rather too youthful
Don Alfonso. Roman Trekel is an experienced
singer and accomplished actor, but his
boyish good looks make a mockery out
of lines such as Despina’s ‘what does
an old man like you want with a young
girl like me?’
Barenboim’s conducting
also seems out of step with the production.
For such a sassy take on the piece,
his tempi and phrasing seem stodgy and
cumbersome. It’s OK, but in a very ordinary,
unremarkable sort of way.
The picture quality
and sound quality are both excellent,
and there are loads of index points.
I would question the need to spread
over two discs, especially as there
are no extras – the recent Die Fledermaus
I reviewed was as long and went comfortably
onto one disc.
This is certainly a
thought-provoking and inventive production,
nowhere near as awful as some critics
would have you believe. But given the
particular concept here, I doubt I can
recommend it as a first library choice
for repeated viewings.
Tony Haywood
Chorus and Orchestra of the Berlin State Opera/Daniel
Barenboim 
TDK
DVOPCFT [2 DVDs: 179 minutes] 