On a damp September evening, Bampton Classical Opera brought the warmth and romance of Italian sunshine to a corner of Westminster, London. A little-known early work by Mozart was presented by BCO in this, their twentieth birthday production. Polished with their engagingly fresh approach to opera, the outcome was a surprising and surreal encounter: one in which young Mozart met Magritte!
La finta semplice , an opera buffa in three acts, was written in 1767 by the twelve-year-old Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. For various potential reasons including a misunderstanding between Wolfgang’s father, Leopold, and Emperor Joseph II of Austria, corruption within the opera buffa company, and unfavourable rumours, the premiere of La finta semplice was not given in Vienna as initially intended. Instead, the first performance took place in May 1769 at the Archbishop of Salzburg’s palace.
The libretto by Carlo Goldoni (edited for Mozart by the poet Marco Coltellini) features a storyline that is typical of opera buffa: the path of young love is strewn with obstacles, often in the form of a foolish or ill humoured older man. Yet, through ingenuity and the helpful intervention of friends all ends happily for the lovers. In La finta semplice the amorous couples are Fracasso (Adam Tunnicliffe) and Giacinta (Caryl Hughes), and Simone (Gavan Ring) and Ninetta (Nathalie Chalkley). Giacinta’s aristocratic older brothers Cassandro (Nicholas Merryweather) and Polidoro (Robert Anthony Gardiner) supply the figure of a foolish gentleman two-fold. La finta semplice, the title character whose intervention permits the happy course of love, is Fracasso’s sister Rosina (Aoife O’Sullivan).
The soldiers Fracasso and Simone are billeted at the house of Don Cassandro and his younger brother Polidoro. They are in love with Giacinta and her maid Ninetta respectively. It is the wish of the couples to marry but Don Cassandro flatly refuses to give them his consent. Fortune begins to work in their favour with the timely arrival of Fracasso’s beautiful and clever sister Rosina. A plan is devised whereby she will pretend to be a simple-minded bella to seduce the affections of both brothers and thereby soften their view on the marriages. With remarkable speed, Cassandro and Polidoro fall for Rosina’s naïve charms and make ridiculous gestures to win her favour. Consent is still not forthcoming and so Cassandro is told that Giacinta and Ninetta have stolen the family’s money and run away. He promises the girls’ hands in marriage to whoever can bring them back, and accordingly Fracasso and Simone go and find the girls who are actually hiding in the house. Meanwhile, Rosina has grown rather fond of her two very different suitors and is contemplating whose bride she’d rather be. In the end Polidoro is the only character left single as Rosina pairs off with Cassandro. The younger, timid brother consoles himself that he was not the only one deceived by Rosina’s artful play.
A new English translation by Gilly French and Jeremy Gray allowed the audience to engage more immediately with witty details of BCO’s production, such as the comedy arising out of innuendo, the characters’ interaction with the Magritte-inspired set and props, and the slick timing of action to music. Some memorable moments included Cassandro’s first meeting with Rosina in act one, when talk of nature led to a playful exchange about “birds and bees.” Following this, a somewhat flushed Don sings of how this girl’s conversation “makes my heart a pit a pat!” Later on, in act three, when Fracasso ‘finds’ the runaway Giacinta, she gives an intense aria in a minor-key expressing anxiety over what her brothers’ reactions might be to her supposed theft. Sounding and looking ever more tragically haunted, Giacinta repeats the phrase “I’m fading fast away,” only to be interrupted by Fracasso’s apt remark, “a little melodramatic?”, before he undertakes to console her fears in the longest aria of the opera. Another, almost slapstick moment of genius was when Polidoro, donning a white scarf over his head, timed a series of sneezes around a repeated sequence of music.
Perhaps the most distinct feature of BCO’s production of La finta semplica was the links it drew between the lovers’ expectations on the one hand and their illusions on the other, often by allusion to key themes explored by René Magritte in his surrealist paintings. The set design and selection of props were saturated with references to Magritte’s artworks, which created a sub-textual symbolism that enhanced both the inherent comedy and the key themes of the opera, adding a certain level of thought-provoking depth to the fairly predictable plot.
For instance, coinciding with the arrival of Rosina, Ninetta unveils the famous “The Treachery of Images,” which depicts a pipe underlined with the caption “C’est n’est pas un pipe.” On one level, this revelation is indicative of Rosina’s function as the opera’s la finta semplice, and of the deception to come. On another, the persistent visual presence of this image on stage could offer commentary on the events we witness unfolding within the plot, and on the meta-context of us watching a staged production: we are reminded that images are not what they seem, but are merely representations. Other famous paintings by Magritte to feature in the set design included a backdrop of floating clouds against blue skies, levitating bowler hats, men in suits, and huge green balloons reminiscent of gigantic apples. The beguiling simplicity of these easily recognisable images belies the philosophical sophistication of Magritte’s artistic statements in a manner which reflected Rosina’s artful character. Mozart’s genius ability to perfectly imitate any musical style, the clarity of his ideas, and fluency of writing also spring to mind as examples of sophisticated ingenuity that manifests as seeming simplicity.
The painting “Les amants,” displayed on the reverse of “The Treachery of Images” (the board was swivelled by the performers), picked up on the other central theme of the lovers’ romantic expectations and quest for union. With their faces shrouded in cloth, the lovers depicted are denied the pleasure of sight and touch, and thus the passion of their kiss is defeated. The shroud is also evocative of mystery: what lies concealed beneath? What secrets do we keep from each other, and what barriers do we place in the way of love? The program notes inform us that Magritte intended to remind us of “the fallacies of erotic hope, by which desire for sublimation into the other is forever prevented by imprisonment in our own being and psyche.” On several occasions the couples in La finta semplice covered their own faces with white scarves. Whether this was symbolic of their fear of discovery by Don Cassandro before his consent had been won I’m not sure, but seeing scarf-clad singers certainly proved to be an effective piece of visual comedy!
The cast was well matched, with strong vocal performances and engaging acting all around. Gardiner’s Polidoro was a delightfully clueless clown of a suitor, and Chalkley’s Ninetta had feisty appeal as the clever maid who gets her own way. Indeed, throughout La finta semplice it is the females who are portrayed as strong and intelligent, using their wit and charm to bring the male characters around to their wishes.
BCO and CHROMA orchestra delivered this uplifting, playfully engaging production of Mozart’s first full-length opera with superb timing, both comically and musically. A sparkling, witty delight!