Ruth Leon recommends… Don Giovanni – San Francisco Opera
Ruth Leon recommendsDon Giovanni – San Francisco Opera
I’d love to tell you that my bitter complaints to the San Francisco Opera about how my international readers couldn’t access their wonderful livestreamed productions because they didn’t start until 2am UK time, they immediately changed their minds, and, as a direct result of my complaints from over the sea, they are now livestreaming at a reasonable hour so we can all see them. But I can’t. I don’t know what caused this splendid turnabout but something did, and this girl isn’t going to ask any questions that might cause them to change their minds again.
Director Michael Cavanagh’s new production of Don Giovanni is the third and final chapter of San Francisco Opera’s multi-year Mozart-Da Ponte Trilogy, presenting all three operatic collaborations by Mozart and poet Lorenzo Da Ponte.
The international cast is headed by Etienne Dupuis as Don Giovanni, Adela Zaharia as Donna Anna and Nicole Car as Donna Elvira, all in Company debuts: Christina Gansch (Zerlina), Luca Pisaroni (Leporello), Amitai Pati (Don Ottavio), Cody Quattlebaum (Masetto) and Soloman Howard (Commendatore). Parisian conductor Bertrand de Billy makes his Company debut conducting the 1788 Vienna version of the score.
The SF Opera Mozart-Da Ponte Trilogy launched in 2019 with the production of The Marriage of Figaro (Le Nozze di Figaro) set in America’s early postcolonial period when the American house setting and the nation itself were newly founded. The narrative arc continued in November 2021 with Cosi fan Tutte, in which Cavanagh’s “richly inventive touch” moved the action to the 1930s where the house has been converted into a country club and the characters find themselves at moral crossroads. The director and his creative team of set and projection designer Erhard Rom, costume designer Constance Hoffman and lighting designer Jane Cox conclude their vision for the trilogy with Don Giovanni, set 150 years after the previous instalment in an uncertain future where the house and society are crumbling.
The livestream is available from June 12 at 2 pm PT and thereafter on demand for 48 hours. It’s a great cast, don’t miss it.
Isn’t that a picture of the Met production of Don Carlos?
Review: S.F. Opera sets a muddled ‘Don Giovanni’ in an American dystopia
https://datebook.sfchronicle.com/music/review-s-f-opera-sets-a-muddled-don-giovanni-in-an-american-dystopia?fbclid=IwAR3fXiQzAGw0-aGehh1s2oC9jd9cOK6M9C3k1MFWmSSYk5NxhkaTvXd7x38