Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin exudes nineteenth century Russia—the isolated estate deep in the country, a large aristocracy, the relationship of landowners and serfs, a ‘Superfluous Man’ without employment or purpose, the survival of duelling—Pushkin himself, like his fellow poet Lermontov, was to die in one.
Like any masterpiece, this synthesis of poetry and music already conveys universal sentiments, so why, I wondered did director and costume designer Laurent Pelly feel the need to create "a nothingness that shows human beings in the midst of a dark, empty space... and doesn’t pin them down too much socially or historically"?
This lack of feeling for period and context had me worried, an empty stage, an uncertain period with attractive, largely 1960s costume except for Onegin, whose wing collar and frock coat suggest a man whose time had passed.
And yet his bold concept quickly won me over for its intelligence, insight and admirable stagecraft, backed by complementary performances from a strong cast of singers.
The piece is dominated by a large platform, on which the Larin family meet, while the peasantry gather on the normal stage below, their efforts symbolically making their mistresses’ world keep turning while they themselves remain almost invisible in the shadows.
Left alone, Tatiana has to take care on her feet as the platform revolves, like the whirl that the arrival of Onegin has created in her usually static world. And later, the different levels remain a symbol of status or separation, as the smartly dressed guests at the Larin ball look down on Lensky’s humiliation with the fascination of small-town gossips.
Stephane Degout plays a rather supercilious Onegin, barely able to suppress a smile as he lectures Sally Matthews’s smitten Tatiana on the follies of young love. For all his later remorse, it makes one less sympathetic as, some years later, this returned cad falls at the feet of his formerly rebuffed admirer.
Matthews gives a showpiece performance, expressive in every gesture of the emotions of a young girl buried in her books and dreams, infatuated, petulant in expectation, then tense while Onegin casually delivers his lecture and frozen with embarrassment while the ridiculous M. Triquet (Christophe Mortagne)—the best entertainment that this rural backwater can offer—sings his banal birthday eulogy.
While one wonders how much the shallow Onegin has really changed by the final act, Tatiana has been transformed and despite regrets is now the dutiful society wife. "How close we were to happiness," she laments, almost with anger in that rich, smooth soprano that would break more hearts than Onegin’s.
Tenor Bogdan Volkov is on top form as an eager-beaver Lensky, exuding what turns out to be a fragile cheerfulness; when that is fractured, he too disintegrates and falls into a sort of insensibility leading to that fatal duel. Before it takes place, Pelly leaves him perfectly alone, in darkness, for the lovely lament "Kuda, kuda" ("Where have my golden years of youth all gone?") sung with a sweet, unforced quality, Volkov staring into the void as if it has swallowed those past happy days.
Lilly Jørstad is a fine, boisterous, hopscotching Olga, clearly having the time of her life when dancing with the flirtatious Onegin. Bernadetta Grabias as Larina and Cristina Melis as the nurse are excellent in support, the latter affecting a halting walk to counter the fact that there does not seem a great age difference between the four women in the household.