Hanans Site

Opera News have reviewed my latest show:

In his many interviews leading up to the first night of his new production of La Bohème for English National Opera (delayed from Feb. 2 to 4 due to a snowfall that brought the British capital to a virtual standstill), Jonathan Miller complained, not for the first time, of his recent neglect by Britain’s major theater and opera companies. To the latter, in particular, he has given a series of long-term hits. English National Opera’s audiences have been treated to umpteen revivals of his Mikado, Rigoletto and Barber of Seville, and only marginally fewer of his La Traviata and Der Rosenkavalier. At Covent Garden, his Così Fan Tutte has equally become part of the furniture.

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South Florida Classical Review attended Rigoletto and gave us the following review:

Rigoletto ain’t pretty. Sorry to be so blunt. But for pretty, go to later Verdi calling cards, the likes of La Traviata, A Masked Ball, Otello. This trio alone could make “pretty” blush by comparison.

Not so, Rigoletto. It’s a black hole of irony, curses, revenge and tragedy from which little light or life can escape.

It’s also a slam-dunk season-opener if ever there were one. It’s an obvious choice if Palm Beach Opera wanted to walk on the wild side for its first production of 2008-09. And Saturday night’s second cast positively wallowed in the mud-slinging, wading waist-deep in the seedy side of humanity.

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The first time we see the Queen of the Night in Arizona Opera’s “The Magic Flute,” she is perched above the stage, astride a camel with angelic wings.

The beast, hanging from ropes, lands with a quiet wooden thump on a set minimally dressed to resemble a multilayered mesa that occupied almost every inch of the Tucson Music Hall stage.

It is one of many subtle effects stage director/set designer Thaddeus Strassberger created to bring Mozart’s masterpiece of comedy and fantasy into the 21st century.
Other touches included puppeteers marching with animal masks on sticks to represent the beasts Papageno (Joshua Hopkins making his Arizona debut) encounters on his journey to collect birds for the Queen of the Night (soprano Heather Buck); and six actors sharing the colorful costume of the serpent chasing Tamino until he fainted in a lump.

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