Pink-suited fun and an ideal foil in a dreamy double bill
THE husband of the eponymous Susanna in Wolf-Ferrari’s one-act comic opera of 1909 suspects her of having a lover.
He’s smelt tobacco on her — and she’s been seen outside the house, contrary to his instructions. Her secret, it turns out, is that she is the smoker. Poor Susanna: if the lung cancer doesn’t get her, the patriarchy will.
Susanna’s Secret is Wolf-Ferrari’s best-known opera, though not his best. But it’s pleasantly entertaining, especially in this sharp production by John Wilkie, conducted ably by John Andrews.
Richard Burkhard, appropriately ridiculous in a pink suit, is the jealous husband, Gil, while Clare Presland, though sometimes pushing hard, enjoyably plays up the flirtatious side of Susanna.
The priceless antics of John Savournin in the mute role of the servant Sante are straight out of the Basil Fawlty school of faux obsequiousness.
Tchaikovsky’s one-act Iolanta, with its theosophically tinged libretto by the composer’s brother Modest, provides an ideal foil. The metaphysics of Iolanta’s psychosomatic cure from blindness are barely touched upon in Olivia Fuchs’s production, though takis’s striking set, with its shafts of light and translucent screens round the sickbed, tap into the work’s symbolism.
Natalya Romaniw as Iolanta and David Butt Philip as Count Vaudémont both sing with tremendous power and passion in their stirring duet, and Mikhail Svetlov deploys his sepulchral Russian tone colour to great effect as Iolanta’s father René.
Grant Doyle and Ashley Riches are in good form as Robert and Ibn-Hakia, while Sian Edwards conducts with a compelling Romantic sweep.
⬤ Until Aug 3 (0300 999 1000, operahollandpark.com)