A Generic ‘Falstaff’ Lacking in Sparkle From San Diego Opera

Recite the repertory of opera in Southern California and it sounds like stuttering. “Madama Butterfly” at the Music Center; “Madama Butterfly” in Orange County. “Cosi Fan Tutte” here (Opera Pacific last season), “Cosi” there (San Diego Opera this season). “Hansel and Gretel” comes this spring to San Diego, this fall to Los Angeles. In September, “Falstaff” was one of the opening operas of the current L.A. Opera season. Saturday night at Civic Theatre, San Diego Opera opened its current season with, you guessed it, “Falstaff.”

Still, there is every reason to revive Verdi’s last opera and one of the most perfect and meaningful comedies ever made in any art form. Understand Sir John, and we begin to understand the repercussions of a big personality. Verdi, who was approaching 80 when he wrote “Falstaff,” had no patience for squandering time. His music changes moods as fast as thought. The moments to reflect are brief and intense, and the intensity is actually deepened by brevity. Rodomontade Falstaff suffers real indignity and recovers; his enemies forgive and move on; life is short and must be lived and celebrated now, not wasted fuming over foibles.

San Diego Opera had its own dramatic episode of just such fuming that nearly brought down its opening night, when the orchestra negotiated into the night Friday over its contract. Emotions must have run high. A strike would have spoiled not only an opening night but a special evening for Ian Campbell, head of the company since 1983. The production marks Campbell’s return to stage directing after 16 years and is the first he has directed in San Diego.

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Most directors take a literal approach to “Falstaff,” satisfied to keep the opera always moving, the intricate ensembles clear, the humor and slapstick funny and focused. It is practically a job of choreography. Such, too, was Campbell’s way. He provides few individual touches, but he provides deft, fleet, sure staging. The set by Peter Dean Beck re-creates a stylized Elizabethan theater and works well, if overly generic in its properties (the central banister might just as well have been the prefabbed kind available at hardware stores everywhere).

It is a production that stays out of the way, and with a strong, charismatic cast, a lively conductor, an alert orchestra and chorus, that is not a bad thing, considering all there is going on musically and theatrically in “Falstaff.” And, of course, considering just how irresistible Falstaff is himself.

The Welsh baritone Philip Joll was not, however, a particularly funny nor bold Falstaff. His voice told us too much about Falstaff’s insecurities and not nearly enough about his charm. The laughs heard in the audience were to Campbell’s colloquial supertitles, not the stage or score.

There are few exceptional voices in this production. Annelies Chapman and Bruce Fowler, the young lovers Nannetta and Fenton, were admirably lyric. David Malis’ Ford was not strongly sung, but well--if conventionally--acted. The merry Windsor wives, Alice (Deborah Riedel) and Meg (Carla Wood), along with Dame Quickly (Sharon Graham), were, again, capable but bland. Peter Blanchet and Ryan Allen were enthusiastic and amusing as the slapstick characters Bardolfo and Pistola; Paul Ferris was less so as the unpleasant Dr. Caius.

Edoardo Muller conducted a fluid but unsparkling performance; the orchestra (still angry? under-rehearsed?) played the notes without luster. The chorus sounded simply woeful, unable to create any magic whatsoever in Windsor Park Forest.

* “Falstaff,” Civic Theatre, 3rd Avenue and B Street, San Diego. Tuesday, 7 p.m.; Friday, 8 p.m.; Sunday, 2 p.m.; Feb. 3, 7 p.m. $31-$93. (619) 570-1100.