Mozart’s Magic Flute is an unusual opera, full of Viennese slapstick, magic and strange journeys through a fairy-tale landscape.

Emanuel Schikaneder, who wrote the libretto, was a theatre-manager, actor and most importantly, Mozart’s friend. The two relished working together and being both a little strapped for cash in 1791, they strove to create an opera that would be entertaining, comical and meaningful. In other words, it had to have everything. And who better than Mozart to convey all of the above in music!

The tale begins simply. Prince Tamino has fallen for the Queen of the Night’s daughter, Pamina, who has been abducted by the High Priest, Sarastro. Sarastro is using Pamina as a hostage to stop the Queen of Night wreaking havoc upon his people.

Sarastro’s character is interesting. He is both evil, having abducted Pamina, and fair, seeing it his duty to protect his community. Nevertheless, he rules his people with a rod of iron and forces Tamino and Pamina to undergo terrible trials before he allows them to be together.

Is Sarastro good or bad? The truth is, he is both. This is exactly what makes this opera so endlessly fascinating.

This is Simon McBurney’s 3^rdstab at The Magic Flute since its first outing in 2013 so he has had plenty of practice with this enigmatic narrative and has earned huge acclaim for the fruits of his labour.

The staging is of course superb. You would expect this with McBurney. It is not so complex as to detract from the singing. The direction is fluid, lucid and funny.  Michael Levine’s drawbridge stage design is simple and very effective: hoisted and tilted at an awkward angle it symbolises the character’s psychological turmoil; raised up, it becomes the neon-lit roof of Sarastro’s priestly sanctum. Laid flat it is becomes the high priest’s meeting table.

Special visual projections and sound effects enliven the bare scenery. They are a speciality of McBurney. Most memorable is Papageno’s trial of silence where Papageno’s footsteps and scrunching sweet wrappers are amplified to great comic effect.

Thomas Olieman’s Papageno was a triumph on the night. Not for the first time I hear. Olieman knows how to appear deliciously absurd or touchingly tragic. His wish to hang himself (because he has no love) is shocking in amongst all the horseplay. Olieman’s marvellous baritone voice seemed happy singing comedy or tragedy. It is clearly a role made for him.

Meanwhile, Lucy Crowe, playing Pamina, was entrancing. Her crystalline, lyrical soprano, enraptured the audience and the pairing with Rupert Charlesworth taking up his first ENO leading role as Tamino, worked like a dream. Their voices melded together beautifully and Charlesworth was convincing as her princely paramour.

The baddies in the piece were equally good. German soprano, Julia Bauer, making her house debut as The Queen of Night, was a menacing presence in her wheel chair as she held out her knife to her daughter and asked her to kill Sarastro. In the famous, “I’ll have revenge, no longer can I bear it”, her staccato coloratura skills and her four top F’s showed her remarkable vocal control, but she never lost sight of her malevolent, witchy character. Meanwhile, Brindley Sherratt had gravitas as the powerful Sarastro and Daniel Norman, was very creepy as the sexual deviant, Monostatos.

Most bewitching were the three Genii (see title photograph) sent to guide Tamano and Papageno along their journey.  ‘The three boys’, who trotted along with their canes, their long, white hair standing up on end, looked as they had just walked out of a Tolkien novel. Their vocals were brilliantly ethereal, discordant and bizarrely beautiful.

It is rare to be presented with such a perfect operatic production. ENO is having a good run at the moment. Of course McBurney, the singers and orchestra had good material to play with in the first place. But from start to finish, McBurney’s direction not only makes sense but it flows effortlessly. No lulls in this Magic Flute. The special effects provide the necessary magic intrinsic to the work.

And what of Tamano and Papagano? They are not only saved by the power of love. The magic flute and chimes protect them from evil spells. Music becomes their salvation. And strange friends along the way, some with questionable morals, become their mentors and guides. It’s a topsy-turvy world in The Magic Flute, one which we all know too well.

 

 

KH

 

The ‘Magic Flute’ continues : 21, 23 and 28 March and 2,9 and 11 April at 7.30pm. 16 March at 6.30pm and 6 April at 3p