Review: Shadowy, fairy-tale ‘Rusalka’ is SF Opera at its best

Rachel Willis-Sørensen (left) plays the title role, and Jamie Barton is Jezibaba in the San Francisco Opera’s “Rusalka.” Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

The San Francisco Opera’s new production of Dvorák’s “Rusalka,” which opened at the War Memorial Opera House on Sunday, June 16, is one of those thrilling efforts in which all the component parts work together flawlessly. A superb cast, a thoughtful and visually striking production, first-rate work from the orchestra pit — this is the kind of collaborative offering that shows the company at its finest.

That isn’t typically what people mean when they talk about a fairy-tale outcome, but who are we to be sticklers about such matters? I’ll take it.

In any case, the relationship between “Rusalka” and the fairy-tale tradition is, like nearly everything in this opera, a little shadowy. In setting the story of a water nymph who falls for a human prince, Dvorák drew on the familiar tropes of folklore but mixed them up in intriguing and sophisticated ways.

The libretto, by the Czech poet and playwright Jaroslav Kvapil, draws on a blend of literary sources that shifts around depending on what notes you read. Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Little Mermaid” is in there, certainly — fans of the Disney film adaptation will recognize, for instance, the title character’s difficulty selling herself romantically without a voice — as well as a variety of Czech and French legends.

But compared to some of that material, “Rusalka” is a surprisingly dark affair — morose, haunted and wonderfully pessimistic about the possibilities of romance across the line dividing mortals from the spirit world. And Dvorák’s score, which is steeped in nocturnal woodland colors and weighty orchestral landscapes, is like a moody cross between Wagner’s “Das Rheingold” and “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” of Mendelssohn.

When the San Francisco Opera gave “Rusalka” its only previous outing here, in 1995, the story was moonlit, certainly — a forced move in an opera whose most famous aria is the title character’s “Song to the Moon” — but also steeped in the pastel hues of a storybook. It takes a production as fiercely and fearlessly intelligent as the current one, which was created by David McVicar for the Lyric Opera of Chicago in 2014 and is staged here by Leah Hausman, to bring out the opera’s truly demonic undercurrent.

Rachel Willis-Sørensen and Kristinn Sigmundsson as the Water Goblin in the San Francisco Opera’s “Rusalka.” Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

McVicar does that, in part, by flipping the script and framing the drama from the perspective of the Prince, who conjures up Rusalka as a feverish fantasy of escape from the unhappy marriage he’s being corralled into with a character known only as the Foreign Princess. All of this is lucidly laid out during the opera’s overture, and it provides a helpful motivation for the sense of doom that pervades the entire narrative.

It also makes space for a visual palette that is always imaginative and often outlandish, as befits a princely dream of the supernatural. Jezibaba, the sorceress who helps Rusalka make her uneasy transition to the mortal world, is attended by a hilariously unsettling trio of human-sized crows in shabby formal wear; the wood nymphs in Rusalka’s native forest cavort through a cartoonish version of a picnic outing.

The Prince’s palace, by contrast, is equally murky but all too earthbound. The kitchen where game animals make a transition, not unlike Rusalka’s, from the forest where they belong to the dining room where they don’t, is a blood-smeared abattoir; the ballroom where a corps of dancers render choreographer Andrew George’s vivid ballet feels suitably close and oppressive.

Laura Krumm (seated, center) and Philip Horst in the blood-spattered kitchen scene in “Rusalka.” Photo: Cory Weaver / San Francisco Opera

None of this, though, would matter so much or feel so theatrically heightened if not for the magnificent musical values on display from top to bottom. Presiding over everything, in a company debut of astonishing vibrancy and assurance, was conductor Eun Sun Kim, who drew glorious playing from the Opera Orchestra and paced every scene freely but precisely.

In the title role, soprano Rachel Willis-Sørensen gave a performance of heroic power and tenderness, underscoring the Wagnerian aspects of Dvorák’s writing even at the expense of its lyricism. Her “Song to the Moon” in Act 1 was more a stirring exhortation than a private reflection; the extended scene at the beginning of Act 3 in which Rusalka bemoans her fate boasted a magnificent expressive urgency.

Tenor Brandon Jovanovich gave the Prince a veneer of heedlessness through which the character’s agony welled up in exquisitely shaped vocal phrases. Mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, as Jezibaba, combined spiteful black magic with a tinge of grandmotherly compassion in a performance whose vocal shadings supported all that dramatic complexity.

Soprano Sarah Cambidge, just out of her time as an Adler fellow, showed the outlines of a promising Wagnerian career to come in her fine, muscular performance as the Foreign Princess, and bass Kristinn Sigmundsson brought welcome vocal heft to the role of Rusalka’s father, the Water Goblin. Even the smaller roles were beautifully handled, by Natalie Image, Simone McIntosh and Ashley Dixon as the Rhinemaidenesque trio of wood nymphs, and by Philip Horst and Laura Krumm as the palace staff.

The underlying theme of “Rusalka” — stay in your own lane where matters of the heart are concerned — may be a cautionary and even downbeat one. But the success of this production is a heartening lesson for everyone.

“Rusalka”: S.F. Opera. Through June 28. $26-$398. War Memorial Opera House, 301 Van Ness Ave., S.F. 415-864-3330. www.sfopera.com 

  • Joshua Kosman
    Joshua Kosman Joshua Kosman is The San Francisco Chronicle’s music critic. Email: jkosman@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @JoshuaKosman