Review: Medea at National Opera House, Wexford
Ophelia may have passed but a stormy weather alert put the fireworks on hold at the opening of the 66th Wexford Festival Opera. The curtain went up on a production of Medea by Luigi
Cherubini composed in the dying days of the 18th century just after the French Revolution.
The production was directed by the Cork native Fiona Shaw whose visceral portrayal of the infanticidal matriarch of Greek mythology was a career-defining role on stage in the West End and Broadway.
Underscored by the overture, three children play-fight against a backdrop of childlike pencil drawings before we are lead into a contemporary gym where a bizarre lycra-clad hen party are engaged in working out, sipping champagne and dressing up in 18th century fancy dress. A track-suited Jason arrives to present his new fiancé with the ‘golden fleece’, here a sheepskin rug.
The second act moves to a trendy child’s bedroom with an incongruous large rocky outcrop at the centre that the singers stumble over and around until the final curtain. The moment of the murder of the children (smothered as they sleep under their duvet) seems strangely lacking in any note of tension and feels like a merciful release for the audience.
There is a lot of ideas and detail in the staging that doesn’t quite gel and the fussy on-stage activity conspires at times to distract from the singing.
On a more positive note, Norwegian soprano Lise Davidsen is very impressive in the demanding title role with a satisfying Wagnerian heft to her voice. She manages to inject real menace without any help from the staging.
There is also some lovely detail from the wind section of Festival Orchestra under Stephen Barlow, notably from flute and bassoon.
Overall, the production was well received although it never quite produced the fireworks one might have anticipated.
