This was my first experience of Opera. I was told that I would either love it or hate it. I thought I would give it a go, because until you give something a chance you never know if you could have missed a love which could have continued for a lifetime. I threw myself into it, and three of us
donned gowns for the occasion. That was mistake number one. Nobody else was dressed up. In fact, almost every other person was wearing jeans. So we felt a little stupid. I was really disappointed that people had not made the effort. I was hoping for something out of 'Pretty Woman', which if I am honest is the intertextual reason I chose La Traviata against the other tragic operas.
Unfortunately, I found it to be rather slow and cumbersome. The stage was far too small for this production, and I found members of the chorus and the elaborate staging to be rather distracting. Nor was I a fan of the subtitles, which seemed to delay forever on one sentence when it was clear that the singer had said far more. It was also very distracting and I think I lost a lot of the emotion from the scenes because of it.
Towards the end, I found myself thinking about what I had to do at work the next day. The main character took a month of Sundays to die, and when she did that was still not the end!
There were two saving graces to this production. The first was the use of curtains in portraying different scenes. The swish used in the transfer was dramatic but in propertion.
The second were the male voices, all of which were outstandiing.
This production did not cause me to fall in love with the Opera, although I would like to give it a second chance at a more prestigious venue.
Image above not my own.
2.5/10
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