Last night I saw a performance of Chicago Lyric opera’s production of Puccini’s Tosca and it was a fine one. The production is the gorgeous 45 year old Zeffirelli Covent Garden production we’ve been seeing for many years at Lyric, an even older production than the one whose absence caused such a stir in New York this season.
Our cast was possibly the least Italian cast I’ve ever seen in a production of Tosca and despite that or, perhaps, because of it the performance was also one of the more emotional productions I’ve seen lately.
Deborah Voigt sang Tosca. To my eye she seems to have put back on some of the weight that she famously lost but with it has returned her vocal power. I thought her Tosca was quite lovely but a somewhat different Tosca than many I’ve heard over the years, less the grand diva. That allowed more of Tosca’s other qualities to dominate and, although perhaps it was just me, I thought I noted more of Tosca’s natural simple piety in this performance. Her second act aria, Vissi d’arte, was less a testament or even a manifesto as it so frequently is and more a prayer, as I think was intended.
Russian tenor Vladimir Galouzine was our Cavaradossi. His is a powerful tenor voice with baritone coloring, sure high notes and plenty of “sob”, appropriate for Cavaradossi. Indeed, I thought his Cavaradossi was the best I’ve heard in quite a while.
James Morris, better known for Wagnerian roles and acknowledged as the finest Wotan of his generation, gave a subtle and, I thought, snake-like performance as Baron Scarpia. He is unquestionably one of our finest singing actors. The man has enormous stage presence which enables him to present a nuanced, more understated portrayal of one of opera’s most wicked villains than is frequently seen.
I’m going to make a confession: I like Tosca. It’s one of my very favorite Italian operas. Perhaps it’s because of the two great tenor arias. Yes, it’s cornball. But the music is glorious, the intricate plot is compelling, the characters vibrant, and at two hours and forty-five minutes it’s short enough that I’m not tortured by Lyric’s execrable seating. Last night’s performance was one I’ll remember fondly for a long time.
The Reviews
John Von Rhein found it adequate but not thrilling:
Vocally, Voigt was uneven, her spinto sound sometimes bright and penetrating, sometimes shrill and problematic of legato. “Vissi d’arte” was disappointing, the ends of phrases evaporating in thin air. At least she looked terrific in her black, curly wig and tiara, her figure swaddled in red velvet.
None of the three principals is especially Italianate in timbre or style, but Vladimir Galouzine came the closest to injecting idiomatic thrills into the evening. The Russian’s dark, baritonal tenor had quality, presence and reach, and he made exciting showpieces of both arias, topped off with fearless, clarion high notes. He was believable as both ardent lover and political pawn in the police chief Scarpia’s sadistic blood sport.
James Morris’ seasoned Scarpia was commendably restrained, a ruthless, corrupt monster beneath his aristocratic airs. Allowances had to be made for a rather dry sound and an Act 1 finale undermined by director Garnett Bruce’s filling the stage with distracting humanity just when the baron, inflamed by his lust for Tosca, was enjoying his blasphemous ravings.
Perhaps I’m becoming more charitable in my old age but, although I find his criticisms fair, I still liked the performance better than he apparently did. It may have hit its stride by the time I saw it.
Wynne Delacoma, writing in the Sun-Times, takes something closer to my view:
This mercurial Tosca was fierce in her jealousy yet touchingly bewildered in “Vissi d’arte” as she contemplated her harsh fate. When cornered by the lustful Scarpia, however, Voigt’s Tosca operated with deadly efficiency, stabbing Rome’s feared chief of police without a moment’s remorse.
Galouzine’s opening aria was a bit bombastic. But his tenor is richly dark and open, and as the opera unfolded, his passion became compelling.
There have been more stentorian Scarpias than Morris. But his tall, fit Baron was calmly certain of his absolute power. In “Va, Tosca,” his phrases unfurled quietly. Pressing against the chorus’ soaring “Te Deum,” they had the dispassionate invincibility of a judge pronouncing a death sentence.
Mike Silverman, writing for the Associate Press, was also critical:
The choice of Puccini’s “Tosca” for opening night seemed based primarily on the star power of soprano Deborah Voigt in the title role.
She turned in an energetic and sometimes affecting performance, but vocally the role doesn’t suit her. Both the lyrical and more dramatic passages demand a precision and dexterity that she has difficulty sustaining after years of singing the soaring lines of Wagner and Strauss. The high notes were there, but she often rushed the phrases leading up to them as if too focused on the payoff.
It didn’t help that Vladimir Galouzine was miscast as her lover, Cavaradossi. His stentorian tenor can be rousing in his native Russian repertory, but it lacks the brightness and Italianate elegance for Puccini. Bass-baritone James Morris, though past his vocal prime, had some chilling moments as Baron Scarpia.
The Lyric’s geriatric staging uses sets originally created for Maria Callas at London’s Covent Garden in 1964. The director of that production was Franco Zeffirelli — whose far more recent production of “Tosca” for New York’s Metropolitan Opera was discarded this season as too old!
NewCity Stage also criticizes the principals as miscasting:
Soprano Deborah Voigt, a stellar Wagner and Strauss interpreter (neither are being heard in this budget-crunching season) and best known outside of the opera world for her celebrated weight-loss surgery after being fired by Covent Garden because her ample size made her unable to wear a kinky designer’s costume, sang the title role, a strange bit of miscasting. Although Voigt was able to bring some drama to the role of the jealous and temperamental diva, her vocal color was far too heavy for Puccini and seems more suited to Verdi. Even more bizarre was the company’s decision to have Russian tenor Vladimir Galouzine sing the role of Cavaradossi, giving that role a heft and coarseness that became particularly distracting in the love scenes. Bass James Morris who, like Voigt, is most associated with Wagner and sang his marvelous Wotan for Lyric’s only two “Ring†cycles in its history, has been the company’s Scarpia of choice for some time now, but his voice, too, is dark and brooding in the role and he has always been rather wooden in it dramatically.
Sir Andrew Davis kept things slow in the pit and while he fired up the melodrama, there was little in the way of Mediterranean sunshine.
I find that under Davis’s baton the Lyric orchestra is a fine instrument although too frequently overbearing.
I think that the reviewers have mercifully forgotten some of the awful Cavaradossis we’ve heard over the years at Lyric, in some cases missing the high notes or eschewing them altogether. I didn’t think that Galouzine was that out of place. I wouldn’t characterize what I heard as “coarseness” so much as something of a lack of nuance. I found that his sureness and confidence made up for that.
