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Die Fledermaus

Company: St Paul's Opera | Venue: St Paul's Church, Clapham
Sung in German, with original dialogue in English by Jonny Danciger

Photos by Craig Fuller & Jonny Danciger

Director-Designer Jonny Danciger
Musical Director George Ireland
Producer Tricia Ninian
Choreographer Will Byram
Production Manager Ted Blackburn
Stage Manager Jan Robotycki
Language Coach Katja Parmar
Technical Operator 
Walter Hall

Alfred Dominic Westwood
Adele Olivia Singleton
Rosalinde Rusne Tuslaite
Eisenstein Thomas Litchev
Dr Blind Ash Howard
Dr Falke Chris Murphy
Frank Ashley Mercer
Orlovsky Jean-Max Lattemann
Ida Meliza Metzger

Best
Performer

Nominee, Offies '24
Olivia Singleton (Adele)

Director's Note

“The lead dresses up in disguise to seduce/manipulate/test their lover." Sound broadly familiar? If you’re used to reading opera synopses, it should do. Don Giovanni, The Barber of Seville, Rigoletto, Così fan Tutte… the list goes on. These iconic operas each include a couple of cheeky disguises, perhaps even three if the librettist went hard on the grape juice and was feeling adventurous. Die Fledermaus features no fewer than six absurd disguises - in some stagings many more. With its multiple odes to Champagne, you can imagine the state of its creators’ livers.

It is an opera that centres on role-playing. Adele wants to be a star, Rosalinde and Eisenstein also don elaborate disguises, and Falke is developing an intricate plot. Throw in a lavish party hosted by an eccentric hedonist, and it all starts to sound rather Hollywood. Our production sets Die Fledermaus backstage on a film set during (broadly) the golden age of cinema. It is a setting ripe with willing actors, moral ambiguities, social climbers and big egos… and, most crucially, well-stocked costume stores. The films of Charlie Chaplin have been a particular inspiration, not just in their comic style but also in their approach to language. The Great Dictator aside, Chaplin continued to release films without spoken audio long after synched sound was an established option. We have applied a combination of slapstick movement and silent-movie surtitles to the staging of the music, which is sung in its original German, whilst I have written a new English text for the spoken dialogues.

On a purely playful level, we’ve enjoyed littering the production with cinematic references. Look out for some fun characters at the party, in Adele’s Act III ‘Audition Aria’, and several niche easter eggs for more eagle-eyed cinema aficionados. On a more substantial level, our protagonists are able to lean into their eccentricities by taking inspiration from cinematic icons. Rosalinde is the diva on our film set, with shades of Joan Crawford and Elizabeth Taylor (she of 7 husbands, one of whom was divorced twice). Orlovsky is our arthouse director, inspired by surrealists Dali and Buñuel. Eisenstein inhabits Chaplin’s sense of chaos, whilst Adele - here a production runner - floats between Marilyn Monroe and Judy Garland. As for Alfred… well, he’s just a stereotypical tenor. Audiences can never seem to get enough of those.

On a final note, it’s important to acknowledge that Die Fledermaus is a fundamentally ‘sexy’ opera. Nowadays it’s easy to misbrand the waltz as restrained, but it was viewed by many at the time to be obscene and hedonistic due to the proximity of the dancing couple. In his champagne choruses, schmaltzy melodies and lust-driven plots, Strauss reminds us that the waltz is a free expression of passion. I hope you experience plenty of it this evening!

So, grab yourself several glasses of wine and enjoy the show. Maybe you’ll spot some of the cinema references, but if you miss them it doesn’t really matter. Like this opera, it’s all just a bit of fun. Prost!

Jonny Danciger presents a stylish Hollywood feel Die Fledermaus. The accompaniment is stellar, as is the performance of the main cast and chorus.

Both Dominic Westwood in Alfred and Oliva Singleton in Adele show mastery over their characters. Westwood is a smooth operator theatrically and vocally. Singleton makes the character the most charming with playfulness in her voice and expression. The role of Prinz Orlofsky was written originally for a mezzo-soprano en travesti. Danciger, however, follows the Viennese tradition of casting a tenor, in fact, a countertenor, Jean-Max Lattemann, who brings such charm and character. Lattemann in Orlofsky is a true Bacchus. In his coppery voice and flamboyant gestures, he truly becomes the prince of the ‘champagne song (Im Feuerstrom Der Reben).' The star of the show is Rusné Tušlaité, the Lithuanian Soprano in Rosalinde. Her performance is incredibly stable and charismatic. She boasts remarkable volume in her light shiny tone. 

London Theatre Reviews

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