Madam Butterfly starring Natalya Romaniw looks beautiful, with colourful costumes and an authentic Japanese atmosphere
Madam Butterfly
London Coliseum Until April 17
There are several good reasons for seeing this spirited revival of Anthony Minghella’s 2005 Madam Butterfly, and one totally compelling one: the Welsh soprano Natalya Romaniw.
Here, this young veteran of the country-house-opera circuit, and, of course, of ENO, shows that she is one of the finest singers produced in these islands in living memory.
It’s not just a scandal but an absolute disgrace that this world-class talent, now in her early 30s, has never performed at Covent Garden, and there are no plans for her to do so. Why not?
Natalya Romaniw brilliantly conveys Butterfly’s various moods; from naive teenager at her sham marriage to the paedophile Pinkerton, through her total obsession with him
Romaniw brilliantly conveys Butterfly’s various moods; from naive teenager at her sham marriage to the paedophile Pinkerton, through her total obsession with him, to her ultimate sacrifice in giving up her baby and her half- crazed suicide.
Pinkerton is the one weak link here. Putting a rough-edged singer like Dimitri Pittas alongside Rominiw is the equivalent of partnering Lionel Messi with a journeyman from Accrington Stanley.
But because Pinkerton is such a heel, many tenors who can do serious justice to the role won’t sing it on stage.
Roderick Williams as Sharpless, the conscience-stricken but ineffectual American consul, is luxury casting too. Stephanie Windsor-Lewis is a persuasive Suzuki, Butterfly’s long-suffering maid. Indeed, all the supporting parts are well taken.
ENO’s music director, Martyn Brabbins, though not an experienced Puccinian, does well, and this show is well worth getting a ticket for.
Happily, there’s no callow, juvenile director to mess things up, as in ENO’s recent Luisa Miller. The outstanding film director Anthony Minghella (The English Patient) was a classical music-lover of real sophistication.
As I found during a two-hour Classic FM show I did with him not long before his tragically premature death in 2008, just three years after this Butterfly, his only operatic production.
But we must be grateful for this: a Butterfly that, for the most part, looks beautiful, with colourful costumes, an authentic Japanese atmosphere and many imaginative touches.
On its seventh revival, this is a banker for ENO – the kind of production it simply can’t do today.