The Met's last new staging before 2020's pandemic shutdown--François Girard's Der fliegende Holländer--disappointingly staged and cast and poorly conducted by Valery Gergiev--returned to port more enjoyably for four end-of-season shows. Girard ameliorated some staging aspects. In Wagner's brilliant Overture--the best orchestral playing the debuting Thomas Guggeis achieved all night—Senta’s double no longer[...]
A gloomy town center surrounded by orderly but claustrophobic buildings. Violence seething under the surface of respectability. A boy whose mother committed suicide after being abused by a town’s businessman […]