★★★☆☆
In 1988 the director Peter Sellars resited Mozart’s Figaro in Trump Tower in Manhattan, “a building with an icy implication of power”, he said presciently. There are echoes of that staging in James Hurley’s production of Mozart’s other great social drama, Don Giovanni, for British Youth Opera (BYO), which takes place in a swanky(ish) tower where Giovanni lives, although costumes suggest more 1970s Rome than 1980s New York. Much of the action, however, takes place in the empty car park, where Jake Muffett’s Giovanni appears to have employed Michael Mofidian’s Leporello mostly to empty his bins.
Giovanni’s power intrigued Sellars rather than his sex appeal; either way, you need to understand Giovanni’s allure and self-confidence. You never quite get there in this show,