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TV REVIEW : Strong Cast in Verdi Rarity From the Met

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The Metropolitan Opera, led by James Levine, is paying a lot of attention these days to the early, generally neglected operas of Giuseppe Verdi.

Most important of these, perhaps, is “Stiffelio,” which enjoyed a huge success at its Met premiere this season, 143 years after its first performance. Taped earlier in the run, it will be telecast at 8 p.m. on KCET-TV Channel 28 and KPBS-TV Channel 15, and at 9 p.m. on KVCR-TV Channel 24.

The director, Giancarlo del Monaco, and his designer, Michael Scott, have come up with a dark, almost Gothic, gently modernized vision of the score, using a new critical edition prepared by the house of Ricordi and the University of Chicago Press.

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With one problematic exception, the cast is strong.

The title role of the cuckolded Protestant minister lies mostly in the middle register and thus ideally suits Placido Domingo’s burnished-copper tenor. He shades the text with sensitivity and gives a poignant, extraordinarily authoritative performance.

*

He is matched as the elderly Count Stankar--yet another of Verdi’s great father roles--by Vladimir Chernov. The Russian baritone makes much of a superb last-act aria that stands as a precursor to Rigoletto’s “Pari siamo” (written the following year), ending the exciting cabaletta on a full-throated high G. It isn’t his fault that he looks and sounds like the youngest person on the stage.

The adulterous wife, Lina, is entrusted to Sharon Sweet, a dramatic soprano whose physical image contradicts conventional romantic illusions. One might mind less if she had the voice of a Milanov or Caballe, but no such luck. Sweet tends to sing mostly loud, individual notes rather than extended phrases.

Smaller roles are taken effectively by Paul Plishka, Margaret Lattimore, Peter Riberi and the veteran Charles Anthony.

Levine’s mastery of the Verdi idiom is complete, and he gives his singers loving support. Brian Large directs the cameras cannily. The opera is sung in the original Italian, with useful English subtitles.

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