Ripe for improvement

Ripe figs won't keep, reminds a poem by D. H. Lawrence in the program book for the National Theater's new production of Mozart's Cosi fan tutte. But the fig on the cover is voluptuously ripe, a bisected, succulent sweet meat that perfectly captures Lawrence's sexual metaphor for "the female part" and the entreaty he ascribes to modern women: "We are a ripe fig / Let us burst into affirmation."

Would that the production had that depth of intelligence and feeling.

The opera, the third written by Mozart to a Lorenzo da Ponte libretto, is a light romantic comedy about the inconstancy of women. Two soldiers wager that their girlfriends will remain faithful, even after the men are supposedly called off to war but quickly return disguised as Albanian noblemen intent on winning the women's hearts. It takes a long time and a lot of help from two scheming accomplices, but the women eventually succumb - as the title, usually translated as "Thus do they all," assures they will.

The material is so insubstantial that Beethoven and Wagner, among others, wondered why Mozart would waste his talents on such a trifle. And by modern standards, the theme and storyline are so offensive that it's hard to present the opera in a straightforward manner.

Yet that's exactly what this production does, eschewing subtlety and wit in favor of broad comedy and sight gags, not unlike a television sitcom. The score is replete with ironic touches that Mozart added, but there's none of that on the stage. The men are cads, the women are well-intentioned but victims of their gender, and with only stereotypes in play, there's no electricity or charm. Director Martin Čičvák's only nod to invention is his periodic violation of the fourth wall, starting with the characters onstage listening to the overture, as if to suggest to the audience that we're all in on the gag.

What normally saves all this is the music, some of the loveliest Mozart ever wrote for the stage. Conductor Robert Jindra turned in a workmanlike performance for the Jan. 24 premiere, though the orchestra started flat and never really developed any energy or momentum.

The singing by the female cast members, however, was gorgeous. National Theater star Marie Fajtová and visiting Estonian soprano Annely Peebo were glowing in the lead roles of Fiordiligi and Dorabella, respectively, with delightfully complementary voices - Fajtová's brighter and more delicate, Peebo's round and full, almost husky at times. When they sang duets together, they were lustrous. And rising National Theater star Kateřina Kněžíková nearly stole the show as Despina, the haughty chambermaid, her voice adding a third dimension to the shading of sopranos and her saucy acting brightening otherwise tepid scenes.

Certainly, the set doesn't help - a large, tilted doughnut that serves as a stage atop the regular stage and has the performers chasing each other in circles all night. It is precarious to negotiate (as the flower ladies discovered during curtain calls), and almost impossible to get on and off of in a ladylike manner. It's also a puzzling choice - ideal for, say, a Wagnerian psychodrama with characters caught in a doomed circle of fate, but hardly the setting for a sexual romp. Perhaps the doughnut is meant to suggest life's wheel of fortune, or the universality of love and betrayal. But by the end of the evening, it was the hole in the middle leaving the dominant impression that, at the core, there was nothing there.

All of which may be too harsh for what is, after all, just an excuse to sit and listen to three hours of sublime Mozart. Historical scholarship suggests Mozart's rival Salieri tackled this project first and gave up, finding it too frustrating to develop any musical complexity for the story. Listening to the evocation of seaside Naples and women sighing in the orchestration, the characterization in the arias and the thrilling vocal ensemble pieces, one can only marvel at a true master at work.

It's also worth noting that, in difficult economic times, the National Theater is doing a solid job of building a Mozart repertoire for the Estates Theater. While this Cosi fan tutte may not be up to the standards of recent productions like La clemenza di Tito or La finta giardiniera, it drew plenty of applause on opening night. And in Fajtová, Kněžíková and baritone Adam Plachetka, the National Theater is grooming a new generation of Mozart specialists who seem better every time out.

If the business with the figs means anything, maybe the women of Cosi fan tutte aren't faithless and weak after all. Maybe they're just seizing that fleeting moment of ripeness.

Frank Kuznik can be reached at
fkuznik@praguepost.com