Stream: ‘Gianni Schicchi’
The return of live music last summer was so welcome that it’s many months since I’ve watched a streamed performance at home. But the dearth of live music in the last month drew me to Grange Park Opera’s streamed ‘Gianni Schicchi’. Made in November and released earlier this month, it’s their sixth specially commissioned streamed opera since lockdown began. If this one is typical, it will be worth seeking out the others.
Gianni Schicchi was Puccini’s first comedy and last completed opera, and was first performed in 1918, the third of the operas in ‘Il Trittico’. Gianni Schicchi, a real-life figure, was mentioned in Dante’s Inferno, and the original story of the trickster who defrauded the Donati family of their inheritance was set in 1299. The opera’s broad humour has made it one of Puccini’s most popular works, likened by some critics to Verdi’s last opera ‘Falstaff’, also featuring a comic anti- hero and plenty of scheming.
Grange Park’s version, entitled ‘Meet the Donatis’ in the witty title-sequence, is in modern dress, set in an elegant town house (loaned by a friend of the company), and has a piano accompaniment by musical director, Chris Hopkins. The intimacy of the setting and the stylish cinematography makes this the closest you’ll ever feel to having opera singers perform in your living room. Buoso’s death – a heart attack on his 70th birthday - and the arrival of his grasping relatives happen in a speeded-up sequence during the brief prelude. The joy of this performance is in the ensemble numbers, and the initial mock grief (accompanied by whoopee cushions and party squeakers, courtesy of young Gheraldino) is soon superseded by the rumour that Buoso’s fortune has been left to a convent. A frantic will search ensues, the bad news is confirmed, and the cast face the camera screaming their greed in our face. Then flinging the drawing room widows open they vent their outrage over the garden to the world. These scenes are musically thrilling, highlighting the twentieth century dissonance in Puccini’s music through the clash of competing egos. Ailish Tynan and Sara Fulgoni as extravagantly-dressed matrons, with Jeremy White and Jeffrey Lloyd Roberts as their moustachioed husbands, lead the pack. The acting is over-the -top, with wonderful use of facial expressions and exaggerated gestures.
Rinuccio, one of the younger generation, seeks money for a romantic purpose. Played by Luis Gomez, he looks forward to his marriage to Lauretta (Chloe Morgan) “on a May morning.” Their lyrical music contrasts with the punchiness of much of the score and includes Gomez’s aria in praise of Florence and its representative “new man” - his intended father-in-law, Schicchi, whom he invites along as a worthwhile ally.
William Dazeley, the title character, is the late arrival to the party. A nouveau riche outsider, he’s a garage owner and arrives from a less salubrious part of town in his red overalls. Treated with disdain by the relatives, he’s persuaded to stay by his daughter’s aria ‘Oh mio babbino caro’, his hand creeping back into hers as he’s finally convinced. His plan to impersonate Buoso is laid out in a splendid scene where he addresses the family from the top of a double staircase. With facial contortions, and much pantomime, he unfolds his scheme to such effect that the Donatis cavort and dance their glee through the house.
There are more fearsome close-ups as the women dress Schicchi for the part, removing his overalls with much mock lasciviousness, as they sing about “dressing the baby”. The notary arrives to hear the dying man’s wishes, and all too soon the family realise their gullibility. Gianni, gasping out “Buoso’s” last wishes, scoops the pool, giving himself the house, the mills at Signa, and the most coveted possession, the mule.
The notary leaves, and Schicchi drives the relatives off with a handily concealed spanner. They run out looting as much as they can carry, Betto (Alan Ewing), the poor relation, adding to the already accumulated stash in the Sainsbury’s bag which he brought earlier. The lovers rejoice in the twilit garden, and Schicchi celebrates with some birthday cake and a wink to the camera.
This is a thoroughly entertaining hour, and a highly recommended antidote to the January blues. It’s free to watch through the Grange Park Opera website or even more easily on YouTube (remember to switch on the subtitles). Worth seeking out are the short videos of a rehearsal (see the window scene from behind) and of the cast recording the soundtrack at the Wigmore Hall.
