Welsh National Opera's Fallen Women (Tour – Theatre Royal, Plymouth)

The dust has hardly had time to settle on David McVicar‘s traditional 2009 production of Verdi’s La Traviata before it’s back on the road as the Welsh National Opera’s Fallen Women tour opener.

Tanya McCallin‘s elegant Renioresque set and costumes provide a chronological colour palette as black, midnight blue and purple represent the wanton Parisian nightlife Violetta leaves for the pristine white of the lovers’ rural retreat, before drab greys and browns accompany her betrayal and death.

Mellow soprano Linda Richardson is a fine Violetta but lacks chemistry with foppish Alfredo (Leonardo Capalbo), while stand-in baritone Charles Johnson brings depth as Giorgio Germont.

The chorus excels in both voice and presence, while professional dancers add further dimension with raucous can-can and simulated bullfights in an opening act exuding hedonism.

Conductor Simon Phillippo extracts great expression from the WNO Orchestra, but at times needs less volume as voices on stage were not always strong enough to compete.

Next up is Puccini’s great debut opera Manon Lescaut.

Boris Kudlicka‘s set is urban and modern – white tile and black plastic seating, simple screens and digital clocks – which, coupled with Bartek Macias‘s flickering video projections, is mesmerising (just a shame that so much of the upper reaches were on show as that rather attracted the eye).

Director Mariusz Trelinski‘s vision is aggressive and sleazy but brutally brilliant, if uncomfortable at times. We are voyeurs as gangland pimps, S&M and drug-inducted sordid nightmares ebb and flow around a street-wise Manon who swaps her shades and trenchcoat for bling and champagne.

Stunningly choreographed by Tomasz Wygoda, the stage teems with relentless life throughout – and with so much to watch, it is hard to remember to read the surtitles.

Conductor Lothar Koenigs commands his troops perfectly, but with such visual overload Puccini’s score becomes little more than a soundtrack.

UK debutant Chiara Taigi not only sings fervently but vamps convincingly as Manon, while Gwyn Hughes Jones is a robust but somewhat indifferent Des Grieux, but again chemistry is sadly lacking.

Last up on the tour is the short and certainly not sweet Boulevard Solitude – Henze’s reworking of Prevost’s novel Manon Lescaut.

So same story-ish, same director, designer, choreographer, similar set … yada, yada.

Cloned stocking-clad Manons repeatedly committing murder in slow-mo, porcine featured lovers, officious boys in blue chalking the body outline, filial pimps in for a quick buck and wanton workers shedding suits after just a few drinks – the underbelly of a timeless Paris is displayed in all its bleak and unsavory glory.

Slinky, superb soprano Sarah Tynan is icily corrupt as the eponymous heartless whore flashing her wonderful long legs – and more – to rinse a succession of undesirable would-be Lotharios. Tenor Jason Bridges sings a convincingly anguished lovelorn Armand and his duets with Tynan are nicely balanced.
Benjamin Bevan is greasily stereotypical as pimping, thieving Lescaut while Adrian Thompson worthily sings pervert protector cipher Monsieur Lilaque.

Koenigs again brings the best from the pit with the challenging Henze score combining 12-tone idiom (not my thing – just sounds discordant to me), jazz (ditto), music hall and blues.

All stylishly visual pieces, but without emotional verve or impact.

– Karen Bussell