Originally scheduled for fall 2020, the opera's rendition of 'Cinderella' opened Saturday at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.
being a runaway No. 1., it’s made regular reappearances in 13-year intervals: first, during the company’s second season back in 1987, with Frederica Von Stade as the heroine and Neville Marriner in the pit. It returned with a comic, modern-dress garb rendition in 2000, as Jennifer Larmore made Cinderella’s treacherous coloratura flights sound easy. 2013’s
“Cinderella” is a fairytale that has no set period and can be staged effectively in any era of history so long as class differences and dysfunctional families are present. For this version, director and costume designer Laurent Pelly places the home of down-and-out Don Magnifico sometime in the 1950s or `60s, crammed with aging furniture, a Hotpoint refrigerator and other period appliances.
When Serena Malfi’s Cinderella sheds her glasses and appears at the ball, she bears an uncanny physical resemblance to a great Cinderella of our time, Cecilia Bartoli — a good omen. And the Neapolitan mezzo-soprano made good on the omen, conserving out her vocal resources so that all alone onstage, she was prepared for these impossible runs and scales of her final aria of wonderment and joy. She did so with flair and command.
Alessandro Corbelli returned from the 2013 production for another go at Don Magnifico, his voice strengthening and becoming more agile in Act II’s opening patter aria. Rodion Pogossov was a preening dandy of a Dandini, and like Corbelli, had his best vocal moments in Act II.