November 4, 7, 10 & 12, 2023
Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre
Atlanta, Georgia – USA
Giuseppe VERDI: Rigoletto
Roberto Kalb, conductor; Tomer Zvulun, director. Giuseppe Verdi, composer; Francesco Maria Piave, librettist. Cast: Won Whi Choi (The Duke of Mantua), George Gagnidze (Rigoletto), Jasmine Habersham (Gilda), David Crawford (Count Monterone), Patrick Guetti (Sparafucile), Olivia Vote (Maddelena), Conor McDonald
(Marullo), Kameron Lopreore* (Matteo Borsa), Jason Zacher* (Count Ceprano / Usher), Aubrey Odle* (Giovanna), Amanda Sheriff* (Countess Ceprano/Page). Creative: Erhard Rom, set designer; Jessica Jahn, costume designer; Thomas Hase, lighting designer; Melanie Steele, wig & makeup designer; Gregory Boyle, assistant director; Ricardo Aponte, choreographer; Rolando Salazar, assistant conductor. (*member of Glynn Studio Artists)
Mark Gresham | 7 NOV 2023
The opening night of Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto at Cobb Energy Centre unveiled a musically and theatrically potent performance by The Atlanta Opera, directed by Tomer Zvulun, the company’s General and Artistic Director since 2013, featuring a strong cast most ably and convincingly underscored by The Atlanta Opera Orchestra under the baton of Roberto Kalb.
A co-production of The Atlanta Opera, The Houston Opera, and The Dallas Opera, this production was last mounted by The Dallas Opera at the Winspear Opera House in October 2022 under Zvulun’s direction, with Emmanuel Villaume conducting and an almost entirely different cast.
l-r: Rigoletto (George Gagnidze), the Countess Ceprano (Amanda Sheriff), and the Duke (Won Whi Choi) at a party in Act I. (credit: Rafterman/courtesy of The Atlanta Opera)
The one key cast member that the Dallas and Atlanta performances have in common is the amazong Georgian baritone George Gagnidze in the title role. Acclaimed for his portrayal of Rigoletto, Gagnidze, in his Atlanta Opera debut, once again demonstrates why, with his strong voice and acting skills, range of vocal color, on-target Italian pronunciation, and sheer physical stamina for the extensive stage time required by the role, all evidenced his appropriateness for the role.
This Atlanta production pairs Gagnidze with tenor Won Whi Choi, also in his Atlanta Opera debut, as The Duke of Mantua, and with TAO veteran soprano Jasmine Habersham, who has appeared frequently with the company since 2016, and here portrays Rigoletto’s daughter Gilda.
Won Whi Choi and Jasmine Habersham as the Duke (disguised as a student) and Gilda. (credit: Raftermen / courtesy of The Atlanta Opera)
Mr. Choi makes a fine foil for Gaznidze, playing the Duke as an energized rake, who makes his attitude toward women plain in his opening aria in Act I, “Questa o quella” (“this woman or that one”) through his more infamous canzone “La donna è mobile” (“Women are changeable”) and its distant, off-stage reprise in Act III.
Ms. Habersham, though not quite as powerful a voice as Gaznidze or Choi, vocally takes Gilda from innocence to experience as a means of growing her portrayal of Gilda through the character’s coming of age.
Among the supporting characters, two standouts for sheer power and presence are, first, bass-baritone David Crawford as Count Monterone, who stands up for the defiled honor of his daughter and is murdered for it, then reappears as a ghost as his casket is carried across stage. He curses both the Duke and Rigoletto—a curse which plagues Rigoletto’s mind through the final curtain. Even more imposing, both vocally and visually, is bass Patrick Guetti, as the murderer-for-hire Sparafucile.
But the real antagonist of the opera is the comapny’s 27-voice male chorus, prepared by assistant conductor and choirmaster Rolando Salazar. They are the first we see when the black curtain rises in the Prelude. They appear as masked, silent, standing shoulder-to-shoulder across the proscenium opening, eventually filing to the sides of the stage, revealing our first glimpse of Rigoletto at stage center—then blackout.
Throughout the tragedy, they are the real villains, like a cross between a criminal mob and a fraternity gone bad, exponents of spite and hatred, a legion of mocking demons.
The Duke of Mantua (Won Whi Choi) with his courtiers. (credit: Rafterman/courtesy of The Atlanta Opera)
The stark set by scenic and projection designer Erhard Rom, while ensconced in an impression of neo-classicism on the sides, with Corinthian capitals on massive columns embedded in curved walls, the rotating central cubic construct is at once harsher, with its clean-edged lines but adorned with a few decorative architectural elements that imply specific settings and atmospheres (using draped cloth to turn a palace into a tawdry inn was one quick but effective solution to having enough “sides” to the cubic structure to accommodate all of the necessary scenes. The right kind of lighting (designed by Thomas Hase) contributed positively to that solution.
The big scenic challenge for Act III, portraying the storm, something that can easily go wrong, was likewise handled admirably by the creative designers.
Between Zvulun’s strong stage direction, the creative team, the orchestra, and the capable cast, the audience got a Rigoletto that was powerful, convincing, and memorable. An achievement of which the company should be quite proud. ■
The Atlanta Opera’s production of Rigoletto continues with performances November 7, 10 & 12, 2023, at Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre.
EXTERNAL LINKS:
- The Atlanta Opera: atlantaopera.org
Read more by Mark Gresham.
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