Product Description

Glyndebourne Festival Opera production of Rossini’s classic opera. Starring Robert Dean, Max-René Cosotti, John Rawnsley, and Maria Ewing. London Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sylvain Cambreling.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #55134 in DVD
• Released on: 2004-02-10
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Classical, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 155 minutes

Amazon.com
All the ingredients for Rossini's prime comedy are present and expertly mixed in this 1987 Glyndebourne Festival Opera production: a Figaro (John Rawnsley) extroverted, ingenious, energetic, and vocally resplendent; a Rosina (Maria Ewing) fresh and sweet but steel-sinewed in her determination to have her own way; a Count Almaviva (Max-Rene Cosotti) who has not only the vocal lightness and agility his bel canto music requires, but a fine sense of humor and the ability to perform a good drunk scene. Ferruccio Furlanetto and Claudio Desderi are equally adept in their supporting buffo roles.

This production is a joy to the eye as well as the ear. Everybody looks right for his or her part; the costumes are elegant and evocative of the story's time and place; the scenery, indoors and out, will evoke Seville for anyone who has seen that unique city. It is all brought together and given point and perspective by Sylvain Cambreling's idiomatic conducting and John Cox's deft staging. --Joe McLellan

Customer Reviews

This is a wonderful, wonderful dvd...
After watching a number of opera videos now, this is the first that simply overwhelmed me with it's enthusiasm and love of the stage. John Rawnsley was incredible as the playful, mischevious, witty Figaro. I subsequently recognized him in "Les contes d'Hoffmann" (The Tales of Hoffmann) / Pretre, Domingo, Royal Opera Covent Garden (1981) available on Amazon, as one of the fellows in the opening tavern sequence. (Quite a good dvd as well, if you want a recommendation.) I hope to see Mr. Rawnsley in more starring roles. Having seen a few stodgy, dark, ungenerous and inapropriately costumed Wagner dvds, this one made me give opera a second chance. Rossini is my new hero as well, of course. (After renting this three times, I can't wait for payday to buy my own copy!)

A good, solid production of an operatic gem
Once, a friend of Richard Wagner's (yes, he had a few) discovered him sitting in the shadows at the back of an opera house box watching "The Barber of Seville."

"How I love Rossini," said the great man, "but you must not tell my Wagnerites. They'd never forgive me."

This is a good-looking, bright, energetic and wholly entertaining production of opera's reigning comedic warhorse. If the singing is hardly likely to make hard-core fans throw away their recordings with Callas or Berganza, it is nevertheless perfectly respectable.

This is one of the all-too rare productions in which it appears that the stage director has bothered to read the text. Why, wonder of wonders, when young, lovesick Count Almaviva is supposed to be singing a serenade, the director actually has him do just that. And when Figaro, the town barber, is supposed to be shaving Dr Bartolo, the comic sort-of villain, he actually applies foamy shaving cream. Astonishing!

Maria Ewing sings pretty well as she manages to be strange-looking-but-beautiful-anyway, funny, indomitable and adorable all at once.

This is probably as good a DVD as you might hope to find for introducing a newbie to the mad, illogical and ultimately addictive world of opera.

Five stars.

A NOTE ON CASTING: One Amazon reviewer has noted with dismay that Maria Ewing who sings Rosina is actually identified as a soprano, not as a mezzo-soprano for which the role was written. Be reassured. More than a few sopranos have succeeded as Rosina in the nearly two hundred years since "The Barber" was premiered. Rossini, himself, coached soprano Adelina Patti in the part. She scored a triumph. (She later became so famous that the barbershop standard "Sweet Adeline" was written in her honor.) Closer to our own time, a certain Greek-American lady named Callas had some success, too.

Great actors
I can only agree with all the other positive reviews of this work.

The singing is excellent, the set likewise and John Rawnsley is the Figaro I have always had in my mind's eye.

But what I liked best about this production is that not only are the singers excellent (which is what one expects anyway) but that they are (by and large) excellent actors as well. Contrary to many operatic productions where the acting is wooden at best, here the acting is expressive (without being excessive) and suits the music and the situation. Perhaps my favorite is the Buena sera scene where Basilio is being chivied out of the room by Bartolo, Figaro, Rossina and Almaviva. The expressions of resignation and exasperation on Basilio's face are superb.

My only quibble is about Maria Ewing as Rossina. Somehow I just couldn't warm up to her. She sings very well, but as a tempestous Spanish maiden who will attract the dashing Count Almaviva she just isn't convincing.

If you like Rossini and Figaro, this is for you.