Period Manners in French Mozart

Don Giovanni at Versailles, The Magic Flute in Paris

Donna Elvira (Arianna Venditelli) pleads with Don Giovanni (Robert Gleadow) Picture by Ian Rice

With its thriving ‘early music on period instruments’ scene, France has embraced historically informed opera performances more widely than any other European country. This past week I attended productions of Mozart’s Don Giovanni (November 19) at Versailles and Die Zauberflöte (November 20) at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, both enlivened by period ensembles: the Orchestre de l’Opéra Royal at Versailles under Gaétan Jarry for the Italian comedy, and Les Siècles under their founder conductor, François-Xavier Roth, in the German Singspiel.

The Opéra Royal prides itself as an historical research centre. That does not rule out contemporary-style productions such as Lully’s Armide, about which I wrote here in May, and while Marshall Pynkoski’s staging of Mozart’s dramma giocoso made no claim for period authenticity, I think it can be classed as an anti-Regietheater production. The settings by Roland Fontaine remained true to the narrative outlined in Lorenzo da Ponte’s libretto, matched to late 18th century costumes designed by the sometime French couture king, Christian Lacroix. It all looked very handsome in this exquisite theatre, which opened just before Mozart’s second visit to Paris and 17 years before Don Giovanni was premiered in Prague. Pynkoski, whose vibrant interpretation of Charpentier’s David et Jonathas I admired at Versailles last year, is not without ideas. Noting the fashion for dark, demonic readings of Mozart’s opera, he says in his programme apologia that he wanted to restore the spirit of the Italian commedia dell’arte on whose characters those of Don Giovanni are (quite loosely) based.