Don Giovanni at the Estates Theatre

by Kate, with musical critique by Karl

I've got a whole bunch of posts to catch up on, including some photos and stories from events that happened last fall. Given that this blog is kind of our family scrapbook from Prague, bear with me as I wade through the backlog.

Prague's oldest theater, Stavovské divadlo (Estates Theatre) is in the heart of Old Town. You can find it at the end of Ovocný trh (Fruit Market) -- just as Mozart did on October 29, 1787, the night he conducted the world premier of Don Giovanni. Mozart's The Marriage of Figaro was staged here in early 1787, albeit not with the maestro at the helm, and was reputed to have been as popular in Prague as it was scorned in Vienna.

Next to the building, Don Giovanni's Il Commendatore commemorates
the lasting connection between Mozart and the Estates Theatre.

"My Praguers understand me," Mozart said.

The Estates Theatre presents dance, drama, and music of classic and contemporary conductors. But the folks there know who butters their bread, and you can count on a production of Don Giovanni coming around during most opera seasons.

When Karl's parents visited last fall, we got tickets for the famous opera. The four of us had seen a 2003 production at Glimmerglass, but the chance to see it in Prague was irresistible.

Since Karl and I have been together, I've attended many more classical concerts and operas than previously. I always try to mind my P's and Q's and behave myself at the various venues. (Apparently lobbing glowsticks around during a big aria is Not Done.) So when I tucked our camera into my coat pocket that night, I was unsure how comfortable I would feel whipping it out to shoot away like a hayseed cousin come to the big city.

I needn't have worried. So many other patrons were gawking and pointing and shooting, I think we would have stuck out if we hadn't had a camera. This was clearly Theater As Tourist Attraction. (Which perhaps didn't bode well for the serious music lovers in our group, Karl and Bob.)

The theater is beautiful. The original cream-red-gold decor was updated in the late '80s/early 90's to teal-gold-cream. So it's a little different from its appearance in the 1984 Miloš Forman film Amadeus, in which it was used for opera scenes. Along with his Best Picture Oscar, Forman scored points for authenticity, although the scenes depict performances in Vienna rather than Prague. Mozart's sentiment that Vienna's conservative patrons didn't appreciate him or his passionate and sometimes shocking work is evident in that clip.

Now to Karl, who handles the blog's musical critiques.

The first impression was an unfortunate one. The overture opens with a pair of stark, static chords, and since nothing is happening as far as melody or rhythm, it's all about the quality of the sound itself. And instead of being a focused sound that bolts you to your seat, this was somewhat diffuse. Not a good omen -- and not in the way that those opening chords are supposed to be a bad omen.

The Commendatore's shadow looms through the overture.

The disappointment continued toward the end of the overture's slow introduction, where Mozart goes through a series of shifting scales that are outside the normal musical language of his time. Done right, these can suggest ghost-filled mists swirling through the theater, wreathing each listener in his own personal fog of terror. These sounded like ... scales.

But it got better. Dad and I were particularly taken with Zerlina, the young peasant who is shown falling for Don Giovanni's courtly manners and self-assurance. A beautiful voice and well acted. The least convincing was Don Ottavio, the fiancé of Donna Anna, an earlier target of Don Giovanni's predations. It's admittedly a tricky role. The social code of the time of course demands that Don Ottavio defend the honor of his fiancée, and the words show that Don Ottavio knows this, but also that he's only too glad for any opportunity to not actually risk getting killed by Don Giovanni. The mix of surface bravado and inner weakness is probably hard to pull off. (At the end, Donna Anna thanks him for his bravery by letting him know she's in no rush to actually get married. He doesn't push the issue.)

The core of any Don Giovanni is, of course, Don Giovanni, along with his servant Leporello, and these were both convincingly played. Our same quartet saw a very different production at Glimmerglass Opera in Cooperstown several years ago, and in that version the sets, the costumes, and the Don's shaved bullet head all combined to leave an aftertaste of Mussolini -- but Mussolini as he probably would have liked for others to see him, all energy and masculine force, not as the clown he sometimes looks like in newsreels when viewed from the 21st century. The Don we saw at the Estates Theater was a more conventional presentation, his manners more in keeping with the stylized behavior of the time, his loutishness wrapped in a smooth exterior.

The sets were worth a comment. They fully took advantage of the historic quality of the theater itself. In the picture below you can see rows of balconies along the back and sides of the stage. You'll notice that these were built to function as a continuation of the balconies out in the theater itself (as seen in the interior pictures above). On the one hand, the introduction of fences, doors, and other pieces of scenery created whatever setting the action called for. On the other, the continuity of the structure between the seating area and the stage drew the audience into the action. Or maybe it drew the action out into the audience. Whichever way it worked, it had the effect of breaking your awareness of the division between you in the audience and the drama on stage.

Fuzzy cast prepares to take a bow.

And the orchestra somewhat redeemed itself. After the dispiriting opening, I was pleasantly surprised through the bulk of the opera to notice that the playing was particularly alive and was responding to and enhancing the drama on the stage. Which is really what the orchestra is supposed to do in an opera. Though it would have been nice if they'd started off by nailing us to our seats.