OPERA REVIEW : Brash, Bawdy ‘Barbiere’ Opens San Diego Season : John Copley’s take on Rossini’s classic is laden with shenanigans and jokes that detract from the delectable music.

Once upon a time, in the golden years of yore, opera companies wanted independent images. For better or worse, they cultivated their own styles. In those days, we had faces.

Now opera is mired in the lend-lease era. Containing costs at any cost, the same productions keep getting moved from city to city to city--lock, stock and forecurtain.

Take, for unhappy example, John Copley’s brash, bawdy, clumsy, vulgar, gag-ridden yet prettily decorated version of “Il Barbiere di Siviglia.” Los Angeles borrowed it from Chicago in 1991. San Francisco grabbed it in 1992. Saturday night, amid gala brouhaha, it opened the San Diego Opera season at the Civic Theatre, where it served as a dubious and belated celebration of the Rossini bicentennial.

Anyone who has seen this show--that’s definitely the right noun--will find it hard to forget. This, after all, is the elegant and witty “Barbiere” in which an ever-leering Figaro enjoys an almost-nude scene before he slides down a fire pole and gets dressed while pattering “Largo al factotum” with an interpolated pesky-urchin obbligato.

This is the “Barbiere” in which a mock-crabby pseudo-aged Berta strips coyly to a scarlet nightie. This is the “Barbiere” in which Bartolo nearly gets his thumb sliced off. This, moreover, is an opera buffa in which the operatic buffoons revel in chamber-pot jokes, crotch-grabbing jokes and, yes, rectal-thermometer jokes.

The stage pictures do exert a certain irrelevant charm. John Conklin’s scenery salutes Magritte’s flying chairs and pristine skies (ask not why), and plays around a lot with old Rossini’s face (we know why, but it doesn’t help). Michael Stennett’s costumes complement the sets with snazzy outfits all in black, crimson or blue.

The diversionary proceedings keep the diligent cast and the susceptible, supertitle-fixated audience, very busy. The theatrical shenanigans shed no light, alas, on the delectable music or, more important, perhaps, on the complex funny-formula plot.

At least the San Diego edition sounds good. In the pit, Edoardo Muller enforces crisp articulation, welcome zest and, where possible, an appreciation for the inherent niceties of light and shade. The orchestra musters a reasonable facsimile of finesse when it doesn’t scramble to keep up with the beat. The men’s chorus, trained by Martin Wright, struts its stuff with disarming gusto.

The singers, for the most part, are strong. Jeffrey Black, the Australian baritone who had been the self-satisfied Figaro in San Francisco, returns to the assignment with his macho poses and beefcake bravado intact, his plush, dark baritone increasingly prone to bluster. Don Bernardini introduces a suave tenorino bianco as Almaviva, reinforced by a nice flair for comedy.

Delores Ziegler is a charming Rosina whose light and bright mezzo-soprano copes gracefully, even expressively, with the coloratura filigree. Ellen Rabiner seconds her in the ensembles as a dark-toned, first wiry, then voluptuous Berta.

The bass roles are entrusted to Kevin Langan and Francois Loup. Both are repeating assignments they had taken in 1987, when San Diego ventured its fourth “Barbiere.” (Isn’t it time the company explored another Rossini challenge?)

Langan boomed splendidly as a needlessly foolish, needlessly seedy Basilio. Loup turned out to be the only comedian in sight who refused to stoop to caricature. He made Bartolo uncommonly sympathetic, even gently melancholic, and, despite some obvious vocal limitations, sang well--even when venturing a castrato-imitation in the lesson scene.

Roberto Gomez paid conscientious attention to Fiorello’s charades and double entendres. (Copley’s dumbest gimmick has Almaviva’s servant point to a convenient keyboard instrument whenever he sings the word “piano,” as in “piano, pianissimo”). Barry Dennen, Pontius Pilate in “Jesus Christ Superstar,” mimed Ambrogio’s intrusive silly-business deftly. (Copley’s second dumbest gimmick has Bartolo’s servant flail a series of batons while the action stops short and the principals line up in front of music-stands that hold scores for other Rossini operas).

Some homage.