The cast and chorus of the Komsiche Oper Berlin's production of Prokofiev's Die Liebe zu drei Orangen. Photo: Leonard Turnevicius
(Berlin, Germany) What wasn't there to love at the Komische Oper's production of Prokofiev's The Love for Three Oranges, er, Die Liebe zu drei Orangen (they only sing in German at this house) earlier this evening?
Sure, Werner Hintze provided what could be called a "conventional" staging compared with the EuroTrash fare seen last night at the Schiller Theater. But Hintze's staging worked, and effectively at that.
And speaking of effective, so too were Mechthild Seipel's costumes. The chorus was decked out in 1920s garb, though all in a cream colour including face make-up. Standing out against that were the colourful costumes of the leads--bright blues, reds, greens, oranges (for the three princesses, of course), black, and so on.
Frank Evin's lighting too, was highly effective, soft pastels changing with the scene or the mood.
The singing could have been a disaster, but wasn't. The scheduled Prince had suddenly taken ill this morning. So, the Komische tracked down Philipp Heo who had sung the role previously, and flew him in from Hannover. There was no time for Heo to learn the blocking, so instead, he stood stage right and sang the role from music while Werner Sauer acted the role on stage.
Carsten Sabrowski has a commanding voice. He did a superb job on sort notice as the King, covering for the scheduled singer who was also indisposed.
Frank Philipp Schloessmann's set was a simple one. From the lip of the stage, a few small steps here and there lead to a raked stage, with the whole framed as though a picture. Again, quite effective for this fairy tale setting.
The lone, minor reservation under Andreas Homoki's direction and Schloessmann's set was that the three princesses didn't pop out of the oranges, but entered from the wings, or appeared from within a crowd.
In the pit, Dirk Kaftan for the most part drew out a fine sound from the Komische's orchestra.
Too bad one patron in Loge 1 fell asleep during Act III and began snoring loudly. He missed quite a bit that he would have loved.
Tomorrow afternoon, Canadian conductor Yves Abel is in the pit for La Traviata at the Deutsche Oper, and later that evening Daniel Barenboim leads his Staatsoper Orchester in a New Year's Eve performance of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony.
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