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Which of us hasn’t at some point fallen for the charms of a bogus sales pitch? A common human experience, ripe for comic exploitation, duly delivered in Donizetti’s opera L’elisir d’amore (The Elixir of Love).
It tells the tale of Nemorino (“little nobody” in Italian), too poor, too timid to tell the woman he loves – the glamorous Lady of the Manor, Adina – that he fancies her. Only after swigging the mysterious elixir (in reality, cheap rotgut) peddled by travelling huckster Dulcamara does he believe he might stand a chance. Of course, in the end he gets the girl and the money, thanks to the last-minute revelation that he’s inherited the wealth of a recently deceased uncle.
An everyday comedy of gullible country folk, but this being 19th century comic opera, the humour is somewhat threadbare. Step forward Harry Fehr, whose new staging (his first for English National Opera) injects sparkle without ridiculing the original. Fehr and his designers (sets by Nicky Shaw, costumes by Zahra Mansouri) have a bold idea: during the overture, the drop-curtain becomes a giant TV set showing an animation informing us that we’re about to watch a sitcom from days gone by, set in an anxiety-free Second World War.
Far-fetched? Perhaps, but it works, thanks largely to the energy that suffuses the whole production. When the curtain rises, we’re in Adina’s spacious mansion. Movement director Anjali Mehra fills the stage with a small army of Land Girls and Boys, all bustling winningly. The opera is sung in the late Amanda Holden’s witty translation (subtly amended for this production): not many people are brave enough to rhyme “bridal” with “suicidal”.
The surtitles have to work overtime but what the singers lack in verbal clarity, they make up for in power and, when required, elegance. American bass-baritone Brandon Cedel makes Dulcamara a blustering, bullying braggart, while in the small role of Giannetta, Segomotso Shupinyaneng proves a scene-stealer, her voice as clear and bright as her stage presence. Belcore, the soldier who threatens to thwart Nemorino’s ambitions, is here a much-decorated airman home on leave. Dan D’Souza plays him as a sweet-toned charmer with a barely hidden nasty streak.
At times these powerful figures almost overshadow the central characters. Still, Rhian Lois makes an attractive, occasionally petulant Adina, able to meet Donizetti’s exorbitant vocal demands with flamboyant style. While Thomas Atkins is entirely believable as shy-boy Nemorino, his voice has an at times shattering intensity, yet in the opera’s hit tune, Una furtiva lagrima (A furtive tear), he combines warmth and vulnerability to bring the house down. Conductor Teresa Riveira Böhm makes sure that the ENO orchestra has the blend of brashness and delicacy to suit the boldness of the staging.
London Coliseum, until December 5; eno.org
