Don Giovanni: blinding flash of light and crashing shot
by Susanne Krekel
Theater am Gärtnerplatz in Munich, 19 june 2022 - These days, the Gärtnerplatztheater shows Mozart’s Don Giovanni in its 2017 production. We went and we were curious, we came and we were convinced. Herbert Föttinger has opted for a modern staging, no cloaks, no daggers then, but a sober costume for Don Giovanni, hoodie and laptop for Leporello - and it works. The stage action is following the music, be it in surroundings that get darker and darker as the story unfolds, or in the stage movements that rhyme with the rhythm of the music.
Walter Vogelweider’s set is minimalist and effective. Everything happens at a street corner, dominated by three buildings with large doors - entries, leavings, games of hide-and-seek, these doors are very useful indeed. Certain details will indicate interior scenes, a few armchairs here and there and most of all the enormous chandelier at Don Giovanni’s place. Then we have two huge illuminated clocks, train station fashion, but they have no hands; there is a crucifix, and later on we’ll have a heap of garbage bags, and other most symbolic items. Albert Mayerhofer’s costumes are most effective, too - mostly in sombre tones, only Elvira is wearing a red gown, and the party guests have been put into pink and red skirts - as is Michael Heidinger’s light design.
The Gärtnerplatztheater has a most wonderful ensemble and tonight’s cast was perfectly brilliant.
During the overture, we see the fateful crossroads, and Don Giovanni in a background alley, smoking an irreverent cigarette under the crucifix - later, it will be the commander who will assume this form. Already we have understood: this man respects nothing and nobody, and his dealings with Donna Anna and her father will confirm it in a moment. And yet his insolent elegance and his flippant show of tenderness fascinate every woman he meets. Thus we will see a consenting Donna Anna and also Zerlina. Mathias Hausmann incarnates Don Giovanni : with his usual drive and his flexible voice, cajoling with Zerlina, authoritative with Leporello, he is convincing down to his fingertips. Next to him, Timos Sirlantzis’ Leporello is charming and funny, his barytone bass warm and powerful. He reminds us that, after all, the piece is called dramma giocoso and we would do well not to take it too seriously. Donna Elvira’s first entry is funny, too, as she marches onto the stage, followed by three exhausted chamber maids carrying an armada of trolley cases, on which Elvira and Leporello will sit down when he shows her the catalogue. If Elvira appears at first as the archetype of the jealous woman, hysterical and ridiculous, we will end up understanding that she is the only one who really loves Don Giovanni. Like any person bound to someone who is victim to any kind of addiction, she will try to make him break free, helpless for her love and the enormity of her task,
Mária Celeng plays this role, and she is breath-taking with her warm and generous voice and her expressive and coherent acting. Just as magnificent is Jennifer O’Loughlin in the role of Donna Anna. Her clear and brilliant voice suits this young woman perfectly, torn as she is between her fascination for Don Giovanni and her duty towards her father and her fiancé, Don Ottavio. Had Don Giovanni not killed her father, she might well have ended up in Leporello’s catalogue. After another meeting with Don Giovanni and after Elvira’s warning, however, she decides to tell everything to Don Ottavio, omitting the details of what really happened between her and Don Giovanni. During this scene, we see Don Giovanni lurking in the background, and when Ottavio sings his love for Anna, totally abandoned in his aria ‟Dalla sua pace”, he approaches, observing, obviously perplexed, as a researcher might observe an unknown species : the emotion that Ottavio expresses, sung most beautifully by Gyula Rab, namely love, is something that he does not understand. Indeed, Mathias Hausmann is convincing also when he doesn’t sing. Don Giovanni’s third victim is the young peasant girl Zerlina, interpreted quite wonderfully tonight by Sophie Mitterhuber. Young, pretty, vivacious, with her light and sparkling soprano, she gets all the facets of her character just right, and she sings with just the right amount of tender irony the two arias that she addresses to her fiancé, Masetto. Alexander Grassauer sings the part just as wonderfully with his strong and ample bass barytone.
Anthony Bramall conducting the theatre’s orchestra drives the action onwards, holds everything together and the rhythm, building up the intensity to the furious finals. We hold our breath as we follow Don Giovanni’s last supper, the visit of the commander’s ghost, sung from behind by Sava Vernić with a clear and deep bass voice, and his injunctions to repent himself - ‟Pentiti!” - ‟No!” - ‟Pentiti!” - ‟No! - and all of a sudden, we see in Don Giovanni our own very selves, humankind on the eve of autodestruction. Just like Don Giovanni, we have been violating and killing, arrogantly we believe ourselves above the laws of nature, and just like him, we categorically refuse to change our ways, rather disappear. Don Giovanni kills himself with the same weapon that has killed the commander, in a blinding flash of light and a crashing shot, and all goes black. Shock, silence… We could have done without the final sextet this time; this final was final. It doesn’t matter however. Tonight we have been treated to a perfect evening at the theater, and the standing ovations were well deserved.
