It’s an always up-to-date women’s play, a global prehistoric fairy tale, an integral part of many cultures: the girl’s dream of the ugly Cinderella, who prevails against the two pretty and better-off step-sisters and is chosen by the prince as wife. What seems like musty social kitsch today still comforts many teenage hearts – in many narrative variants. Few of them, however, are in the Dresden Semperoper pilgrimage, although it is precisely here that the art form opera creates an almost pragmatic distance from reality and thus prevents further disappointments. Because as much as the director Damiano Michieletto tries to keep Rossini’s “La Cenerentola” up to date – in the end even a BMW has to thunder onto the stage with splinters – the artificiality of the story remains visible at every moment.
Ultimately, that’s what defines the quality of this production: that the viewer is always suspended between fairy tales and psychological truth, between pubescent dreaminess and realistic vision. But above all: that you can keep your beautiful dream if you don’t confuse it with reality. Of course, this learning process happens in a playful and highly artistic way. The Rossini specialist Michieletto always makes sure that it is neither too grandiose nor embarrassingly banal, despite all the glamor and even more gossip.
Two bitches and a prince charming
Nevertheless, such a Rossini comedy stands or falls with the acting skills of the singers. And above all, the two sisters Clorinda (Alice Rossi) and Tisbe (Anna Kudriashova-Stepanets) shine as veritable bitches who spoil their stepsister Angelina alias Cenerentola everyday life wherever possible. The poor man has to hire herself out as a maid in her own house, and the high-handed father, Don Magnifico (Maurizio Muraro), lets her feel it. Nobody first recognizes the innocence and greatness of this maid, except the audience. Because a woman who looks a little too good for the role of Cinderella sees it, but above all she hears a fairy-tale voice.
The Canadian soprano Emily D’Angelo has a mezzo that is wonderfully darkened in the depth, a fine, dry middle register and a pleasantly soft height. Even the notoriously fast-paced Rossini coloratura are no problem for her as Cenerentola, everything comes out playfully, but not carelessly. Because despite all the vocal virtuosity, sound design and expression predominate. Rossini has given her the right emotional templates with melodic emphasis, but transform them into stage reality – the singer has to do that, and this does not always happen as congenially touching as with D’Angelo. No wonder, then, that at some point the beautiful prince (Maxim Mironov as a tight lyrical coloratura tenor) picks up and falls for it. Of course, the whole thing is wrapped up in a comedy of mistake, the prince appears as a servant, servant as a prince and so on. The true character of the humble maid has to be put to the test before she, whoosh, lands on the royal throne. But if everything goes well, Cenerentola is innocence and goodness in person. She even forgives her wicked sisters; on the other hand, the authority of the idiotic-violent father never seems to be in question for them. There is still work to be done as a director.
The conductor Alessandro De Marchi also agrees with the outcome of the story, he hops around on his little podium the whole evening, turns to the left here and suggests a squat there. He uses arm movements more sparingly, which is generally regarded as an elegant and sophisticated form of conducting. At the same time, the musicians of the Saxon State Orchestra are more or less involved and do not let their guest trainer down. Good this way.