Fun loving Falstaff hits right note

Paolo Gavanelli's Falstaff totally transforms Graham Vick's production which opened the "new" house a year ago, when it was greeted with a sigh of relief and disappointment.

Gavanelli is thoroughly at home and raring to get at it. He's not had the makeover Bryn Terfel suffered either, with skimpy, vile wig and ill-fitting paunch. He wears the monstrous rubberised corpulence of his fake flab suit with pride, and even dances around semi-naked in it at the end. He looks fun and Santa-like, with looming eyebrows and popping eyes.

The role suits him ideally, and he's experienced at it. He has a proper Italian baritone's cutting focus and snarl in his voice lending a kind of epic majesty. He uses the fine Boito text superbly. He's in touch with the audience. Above all he's irrepressibly determined the whole company (and therefore all the theatre) will have a good time. He rises triumphantly above the inept follies of the laboured, charmless staging, its want of atmosphere, its coarseness. He even drags Bernard Haitink onstage for his curtain call, instead of leaving it to Patricia Schuman's handsome Alice Ford. And Bernard was actually smiling, as the music-making had shown. The orchestra play the rapturous score captivatingly. Haitink gets tension and poise just right.

The cast makes a real ensemble. The ladies' scenes run energetically, with Bernadette Manca di Nissa proving her worth again as Mistress Quickly. Once more, it's the Italian tradition at work - her beefy lower register means "Rev-erenza" can really bump on the bottom. Miss Schuman's alert, sparky Alice combines ideally with her companions. A pity those mad, comic-patter ensembles of the second scene are clumsily staged. Sally Matthews had a tough assignment, standing in for Jenny Grahn as Nannetta. Her Aussie Fenton (Steve Davislim) seems sexy and ripe, but doesn't resonate freely and with ideal lyricism. Of the supporting roles Gwynne Howell as Pistol and (especially) Peter Hoare as Bardolph add to the urbanity and roguishness very nicely.

Simon Keenlyside is potentially an impressive Ford. Fury and wilfulness come easily to him. But he's too careful, too neat and thin-lipped. It needs hot jealousy, not cold; more generous tone, less intellect. Nor has he at all the common touch of a Windsor tradesman with grand ambitions. Essentially everybody in this opera (almost) is looking for a good time. The production is craftily revived and subtly adjusted by Jeremy Sutcliffe.

Falstaff