Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #45388 in DVD
• Released on: 2007-09-25
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Formats: Digital Sound, DTS Surround Sound, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
• Original language: Italian
• Subtitled in: Chinese, English, French, German, Spanish
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 120 minutes

Amazon.com
This 2006 Zurich Opera production of Donizetti's popular Don Pasquale captures not only the opera's high-spirited comedy but also its underlying cruelty. Featuring veteran bass-baritone Ruggerio Raimondi in the title role and a fine supporting cast, this DVD has what no other version of the opera has--tenor Juan Diego Flórez as the Don's nephew, the lovelorn Ernesto--and his brilliant portrayal makes this a must-see for any admirer of great singing.

The basic plot of the opera is a time-worn comedy staple: the foolish old man who seeks a young wife. The Don's doctor and advisor, Dr. Malatesta, hatches a scheme to trick the old man into a fake marriage with Norina, a young widow in love with Malatesta's friend, the Don's nephew, Ernesto. She's presented to the Don as the Doctor's sister, fresh from the convent school, whose demure demeanor captivates the victim who immediately agrees to the "marriage." Once that's accomplished, she turns into a spendthrift shrew who drives the Don to the brink of suicide. Ernesto, plunged into despair when he thinks his beloved abandoned him for his uncle, is finally brought into the scheme and plays his part in the trick. All ends well when the Don realizes his foolishness, blesses the young couple's union and agrees to a handsome annual allowance for them.

Flórez will make you forget other tenors who have sung Ernesto. His voice is sweet and tender but with a touch of steel in its upper range, adding excitement as when he ends a heavily ornamented passage with a ringing top D-flat. His pianissimos are ravishing and his last-act aria, Com'è gentil is radiant. Raimondi, drier of voice than in his younger days, is a fine Don Pasquale, acting with comic brio, breaking into dances of joy when his proposal seems to be working, and plunging into comedy-tinged despair when it turns sour. As Dr. Malatesta, baritone Oliver Widmer is appropriately slimy. Norina is Spanish soprano Isabel Rey, who delivers an accomplished vocal and acting performance, handling her coloratura turns with aplomb and acting with brio. Nello Santi conducts with appropriate Donizettian energy.

Stage director Grischa Asagoroff and designer Luigi Perego move the setting from the mid-19th century to the 1920s, so Ernesto enters in a tennis outfit, Don Pasquale's clothes include a broadly striped double-breasted white suit with spats, and the Don's drawing room changes from stuffy old-fashioned décor to a garish pink-dominated horror after Norina takes charge. The Don's prime activity when not fulminating about his nephew or donning a tawdry wig to woo Norina is caressing his collection of teddy bears. But his pain is all too evident after the transformed Norina slaps him and the inescapable undercurrent of cruelty is fully brought out, making the last act reversals less convincing. TV director Felix Breisach's cameras efficiently convey the stage action, though the many close-ups make it obvious that Ernesto's beloved is old enough to be his mother. But Flórez's vocalism alone is enough to make this the preferred Don Pasquale. --Dan Davis

Customer Reviews

Not a great production of "Don Pasquale" but worth owning for its singing and comedic high points
The Zurich Opera has made a wealth of its productions available on DVD. They are consistently of high quality and feature "house" performers (such as Oliver Widmer) along with star-power guests (such as Juan Diego Florez).

"Don Pasquale" is funny funny funny and then suddenly bittersweet. (The fact that the overture starts with a plaintive cello solo should tip us off that this is more than just an opera buffa.) "Don Pasquale" has some beautiful arias and a great patter duet, but I don't think it sustains the consistently high quality of Donizetti's "L'Elisir d'Amore." For one thing, there's a lot of talking over the music, so much so that what's going on in the orchestra is often more interesting than what the performers are doing onstage. (I would thus disagree with the reviewers who said that the orchestra overpowers the singers; I think it's Donizetti's score that does that!) One example: all the Act II marriage charade business takes place to beautiful orchestral music, the characters just speaking dialogue for the most part.

As Ernesto, tenor Juan Diego Florez gives a stand-out performance. We are treated to his usual meticulous attention to phrasing, one of the many qualities that make him so unique as a performer. The purity and sheer beauty of his voice is something special for our times. Such is his charismatic presence onstage that, as with his Count Almaviva in "The Barber of Seville" on DVD, he turns a supporting role into a star vehicle.

Ruggero Raimondi is not the greatest patterer. (In this regard, he can't match Alessandro Corbelli's Don Pasquale, also on DVD.) But Raimondi makes up for it with a great comic instinct and by having such a good time in the role that we are irresistibly drawn in.

Unlike Raimondi, Isabel Rey doesn't have a natural feel for comedy. However, her strong singing goes a long way to compensate for it (her duet at the end with Florez is stunning). Rey was so moving as Donna Anna in the Zurich Opera's DVD of "Don Giovanni" that I was curious to see how she'd fare as Norina. I wish she had a light comedic touch, one that could, for example, make "Quel Guardo Il Cavaliere" the delight it should be. We do get some beautiful trilling from her in that aria though, and that will have to do.

The pleasant surprise is Oliver Widmer as Malatesta. I've seen Widmer on several of the Zurich Opera DVD's. This is by far his best performance. What was once an indistinctive baritone voice has deepened and developed the wonderful burnished tone that all great baritones possess. And he's become an excellent actor (maybe he's been tutored by his wife, the mezzo Cecilia Bartoli, who is so expressive onstage). Widmer's and Rey's voices blend beautifully in the Act I, Scene 2 duet where they rehearse the charade they're about to put on for Don Pasquale. I love this piece with its great melodies and continuous key modulations.

The colorful Art Deco costumes are delightful, but this 1930's concept doesn't translate well into the set design. The stage is so cluttered and the colors so garish that the sets and props sometimes swallow the performers (when they aren't trying to maneuver around them without tripping). And, I understand why Norina would insist on including a portrait of Ernesto (her true love) in her redecorating scheme, but frankly, sitting as huge as it is in the middle of the stage (and I do mean huge), the portrait looks like a publicity shot of Juan Diego Florez. I doubt anyone watching the opera is able to see it as representing his character, Ernesto. It's as if the big brass at the Zurich Opera wants to remind us, even when Florez isn't onstage, that they succeeded in booking this big-name star at their opera house. (Sorry for the cynicism; at least I'm not suggesting it was in Florez's contract to have it there!)

I haven't seen the recently released 1994 La Scala production of "Don Pasquale" with Ferruccio Furlanetto in the title role. The other DVD available is the Teatro Lirico production from 2002. I'd also give it four stars. Alessandro Corbelli (Don Pasquale) and Eva Mei (Norina) outshine their counterparts in the Zurich Opera cast. But the Zurich Opera DVD is worth owning just to see Florez as Ernesto.

An average production with a great Tenor
Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1848) is still considered something of a journeyman composer, having composed some 65 - 70 operas, most of them fast! Don Pasquale, premiering at the Theatre des Italiens in Paris on January 3, 1843, was composed in 11 days. That is supposed to indicate a hack at work. To me, for what it's worth, it says that Donizetti was a genius whose unflagging inspiration produced one of the three greatest Opera Buffa in music history. Only le Nozze di Figaro and il Barbiere di Siviglia are comparable in terms of melodic beauty and musical wit. Don Pasquale is my favorite Donizetti opera. A recent La Scala production on TDK, conducted by Riccardo Muti, is quite good in a traditional version. This production, directed by Grischa Asagaroff, updates the action to Rome between the wars, sometime during the 1920-1930s. Sets and costumes reflect this. The reason for the update? Beats me! Our heroes now wear spats and pin-striped suits. The decor is Art Deco. And we cannot forget that this is Mussolini's Fascist Rome. Is there a point being made by the Director? Who knows! European productions cannot leave traditional versions alone, these days.

Ernesto, beautifully sung by tenor Juan Diego Florez, first appears swinging a tennis racket. Thankfully, he never says "anyone for tennis"? It wouldn't have surprised me if he had. The director's comic vision struck me as somewhat pedestrian, without that comic sparkle necessary for a great production. The comic bits seem to fall flat. What saves this production is the splendid singing, especially that of Florez, whose lyric tenor voice soars with great beauty of tone. Especially at the upper registers: Florez exhibits a rich, limpid vocal quality, liquid in its movement, precise in its attack. Sort of a male Renee Fleming. It really is a lovely voice!

Ruggiero Raimondi makes an excellent Don in his spats and pin stripes. His warm baritone and age are perfect for the role. He's a pretty good comedian, as well. Norina, described as "a young widow" in love with Ernesto, is sung by Spanish soprano Isabel Rey. She sings quite well, with a warm soprano voice supple enough for Donizetti's vocal acrobatics and restrained fioratura. Unfortunately, she struck me as (please forgive me, Isabel) looking around 20 years older than her part demanded. Also, her voice lacks the unforced sparkle and the youthful quality of Nuccia Focile, who sings Norina in the Muti conducted Pasquale. The rest of this cast is good. The Chorus and Orchestra of the Opernhaus Zurich are capably conducted by Nello Santi. Muti, of course, conducts La Scala's legendary forces.

This DVD has the usual menus, languages and trailers. It was filmed in hi-definition 16:9 anamorphic widescreen. Sound is PCM stereo and DTS 5.1. It looks and sounds great.

What ultimately recommends this production is Florez. His voice is marvelous. Get it for him. Otherwise, the TDK Pasquale is superior. Recommended, but with that caveat.

Mike Birman

Juan Diego Florez is the real deal...but what's with all the teddy bears?
This is generally a great DVD of Don Pasquale, with plenty to love, but also with a couple of caveats.

Let's start with the good stuff, which far outweighs the bad.

The main attraction here is the singers. Juan Diego Florez is the hot bel canto tenor right now, and with good reason, his voice is a miracle, full of fluidity and grace, with brilliant high notes, free of any rough patches, a joy to listen to. Dramatically, he's no Placido Domingo, he's handsome enough, sure, but his stage presence can be a little stiff at times, he still hasn't outgrown the common tendency of romantic tenors to raise a fist whenever he wants to make a dramatic point, which is just nitpicking basically, the bottom line, Florez is the real deal. Let's hope he has a long career, because he is the type of singer who, if you see his name on a production, you know it is something you want to see.

HOWEVER...I can't agree with other reviewers who suggest that his presence is the ONLY reason to purchase this DVD. I thought all four of the leads were outstanding, easy on the ears. Having Ruggero Raimondi as Don Pasquale is a major coup for more than just sentimental reasons, the guy still sounds great, his voice has the agility to handle the tougher bel canto moments, particularly the patter duet, going so far as to reward the audience with a much welcome encore! And speaking of agile, he does a pretty good job of prancing about the stage at the moment when the old Don has his moment of, how shall I put this, rejuvenation. I really enjoyed Isabel Rey's performance, her voice is stronger than some of the more lilting coloratura specialists but still beautiful, and definitely full of life. She's a bit older than the young widow Norina but very attractive, not to mention strong-willed, and she seems to be having fun with all the madcap proceedings. Oliver Widmer gives us an amusing, extremely well-sung Dr. Malatesta(he matches Raimondi patter for patter), a bit more lecherous than usual, but, hey, this is commedia del'arte material, at heart anyway, so why not?

I enjoyed many aspects of the production, I wasn't put off by the updating of the time period, and I thought the revolving stage and large, detailed set pieces were nice touches, but some things bothered me, and here is where we get into the negative aspects of this DVD. The sets and costumes themselves are generally eye-catching, but a little busy at times, just like the stage direction, busy being an understatement, the term I really should use is over the top. Having Don Pasquale cradling a teddy bear is amusing at first, but after about the tenth teddy bear I was ready to shout "Enough!," especially after his tormentors seem to take such glee in ripping the poor things apart. The ruse in Don Pasquale is supposed to be a mild joke with the purpose of imparting a life lesson, it isn't supposed to be destructive. But they don't stop with teddy bears, before you know it they're rending appendages from his statues, tearing off strips of wallpaper, ripping his curtains, defacing his paintings. Again, this is just too much stage activity, too much clomping around. Fortunately it doesn't distract from the singing(for an example of a production really overpowering the performers, see the recent Met production of Barber of Seville, also with Florez), but come on. On top of all that, many of the set pieces are banal, from a statue of a teddy bear to a painting of Florez' smiling countenance to a giant foot in the last scene(what the heck?). If these are supposed to be symbolic, well, I'm not sure what they're supposed to represent, to me they're unnecessary. What is it with all these directors who think that opera buffas aren't funny enough on their own, they have to add all this garish nonsense? Sheesh!

Finally, I agree with the reviewer who found the orchestra too brash at times, overpowering the singers, especially since this isn't that kind of an opera. Don Pasquale is not Nabucco, although I sometimes felt as though I were listening to Nabucco(not that listening to Nabucco is a bad thing). Despite its frantic moments, Don Pasquale is basically a lower key outing than early Verdi and should be performed as such. There are also moments I found a little slow in terms of the conducting, which violates the fast-paced Rossinian ethos Donizetti was trying to adhere to.

I hope by giving such intricate detail to the negatives I haven't given the impression that this is a weak performance. Overall, it's wonderful listening(with singing that could hardly be bettered), a generally good but far from perfect production, with great video and sound quality, and in widescreen! It evens out in the long run, producing an opera experience that comes highly recommended.