Massenet’s late opera Cendrillon brings the Royal Opera’s low-key season to an effervescent if somewhat vapid close.
Massenet’s late opera Cendrillon brings the Royal Opera’s low-key season to an effervescent if somewhat vapid close. I doubt whether a better case could be made for it than in this production, imported from Santa Fe.
Laurent Pelly, an expert in contriving ingenious and non-stop action, keeps the first two acts, building up to Cinderella’s enforced departure from the ball, bowling along against an appealing background, designed by Barbara de Limburg, of wall-sized pages of Perrault’s tale, which slide away in favour of, usually, scarlet settings. There isn’t a lot of characterisation in the music, so it is achieved here mainly by blatant and often amusing sartorial means, with the two sisters parading in a series of stunning outfits that might have figured in a Fellini satire.
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