Opera

Ines de Castro, Theatre Royal, Glasgow

Keith Bruce

five stars

For all the Gothic splendour of the1996 production of James MacMillan's treatment of Jo Clifford's Portuguese history play, this new version is in another league altogether. And it is not difficult to see and hear why. Designer Kai Fischer, who worked on the first staging on a student placement with Scottish Opera, echoes the cage design of the original stage play in the old Grassmarket Traverse in his first act setting. That continuity is paralleled by the presence of the composer in the pit, and the revisions the conductor has made to his score - audible from the moving opening chorus, which seems to have been influenced by MacMillan's liturgical writing since - evidence that both men have had the work very much on their minds in the intervening 18 years.

But ultimately it may be most significant that there is a woman, Olivia Fuchs, in charge of this production. Because what the director has appreciated is that this national tale is ultimately about the dynamic between the two women, Prince Pedro's Spanish mistress (Stephanie Corley) and his wife Blanca (Susannah Glanville), in a way that Madame Butterfly (for example) is not. Both roles are beautifully sung and also impeccably acted, in a cast that has no weak links in that department and only a few smaller voices among the minor roles. The distractingly detailed silent performances of Matilda Gordon and Barnaby Jones as Ines's children in the opening scene are emblematic of the attention to detail throughout.

Act 2 develops that theatricality, with scenes of vaudevillian dash in front of the cloth, and the inspired deployment of an old school overhead projector during the Executioner's song (Gary Griffiths) that contrasts wittily with Fischer's spare use of back projections with his minimalist designs. If Griffiths cuts is a darkly comic figure, Paul Carey Jones's Machiavellian royal advisor Pacheco has real menace, and both Peter Wedd (Pedro) and Brindley Sherratt (his father the King) are tormented, manipulated souls.

And the score is simply glorious, and superbly played by the large orchestra, the percussion spilling front of house into the boxes. This Ines de Castro is essential, and a work in which Scottish Opera can take real pride.