Faust Leeds Grand Theatre

OPERA North’s new season production of Gounod’s Faust gets a mixed reaction.

First, the good things.

Musical aspects are well up to the company’s high standards, with Stuart Stratford’s strong direction of the Opera North Orchestra bringing out Gounod’s no-nonsense approach to the score.

This was matched by the Chorus, despite the imposition of embarrassing movements by the production team.

Of the soloists, Peter Auty’s Faust projected a strongly-driven vocal line, perhaps not quite in keeping with his appearance as a staid accountant. Marguerite, Juanita Lascarro, was vulnerable and touching, but a shade too restrained to let the Jewel Song sparkle as it should. Mephistofeles (James Cresswell) was well-sung, but a little less devilish than the role demands.

On the other side, the production team of Ran Arthur Braun and Rob Kearley created blocks of flats with kaleidoscopic projected images and injected US politics, exchange rates, mobile phones and iPads into the action, as well as dressing the chorus in nasty yellow and green, all distracting to the eye.

Despite recognising the intention, I found it unconvincing.

Performances at Leeds Grand (08448-482700) continue until November 3. Dates at Newcastle Theatre Royal are November 13 and 16.

Don Giovanni Leeds Grand

MOZART’S Don Giovanni turned out to be something that turned its moral values into a blend of farce, with unsubtle gags that even Kenny Everett might have had difficulty with and scenes which, in TV terms, would face problems in being shown before the 9pm watershed. Alessandro Talevi’s production shifts the scene from Mozart’s time via Edwardian Music Hall to 1950s rock. Masetto’s gang has become a gang of snorting pigs, but the musical aspects are well cared for by Tobias Ringborg’s direction.

The cast, when allowed to be serious, were fine. Don Giovanni (William Dazeley) was a shade tame, but suave enough; Leporello (Alastair Miles) doleful and comic. I liked Donna Elvira (Elizabeth Atherton), clear-voiced and balanced, and Claire Wild’s vivacity as Zerlina, both vocal and physical.

It is an interesting production that gives a provoking, if visually variable, edge to the evening.

Giovanni runs in Leeds until Thursday, then goes on tour, including Newcastle Theatre Royal.