No winged fairies populate the pulsating darkness of Scottish Opera’s new A Midsummer Night’s Dream. These sprites are woolly-wigged ragamuffins, a devious bunch who inhabit the crevices of Duke Theseus’s mirrored palace like beady brown woodlice. Night is a time of alarm and subversion, which is as it should be: Britten’s 1960 opera, in every fantastical and textured detail, from tap-tapping harpsichord to belching trombone, speaks of churning mystery.
Directed by Dominic Hill (artistic director of Glasgow’s Citizens theatre) and conducted by Scottish Opera’s music director, Stuart Stratford, this is a bewitching staging of high theatricality, ending with big-hearted, over-the-top hilarity. The wolf whistles and cheers at the final curtain suggest the company has a hit on its hands.
