As ETO's small-scale, gentle rumination on the end of a long life, What Dreams May Come, is playing in the Theatre Royal's Studio, gunfire rings out around the venue's main stage. This is a bigger, bloodier tale of young love cut short by internecine conflict and tragic misunderstanding.
Drawing on the same sources as Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet, rather than directly based on that play itself, Nicola Vaccai's libretto emphasises the entrenched political war between the two families, before shifting focus to depict the doomed love between Capulet Giulietta and the interloper Montague, Romeo. The latter is a 'breeches role', a male character played by a female singer, mezzo Samantha Price.
Under Eloise Lally's assured direction, the setting is mid-20th-century New York, and the warring factions take on mafia overtones. Lily Arnold's stylish diner set and pinstripe suit and trench-coat costumes fall somewhere between Edward Hopper and Goodfellas, to great effect. As the overture launches, we see the Capulet family assemble in the café at the start of the day.
In this version, the disguised Romeo telephones Capellio (Timothy Nelson), the head of the family, from a callbox outside the diner—again a lovely period detail. He offers a truce if he's permitted to marry Giulietta (Jessica Cale). But Capellio has already promised his daughter to Tebaldo (a fabulously moustachioed Brenton Spiteri, oleaginous but not overbearing in the role).
The opening lays out the stakes well, populating the stage with a talented chorus who attack Bellini's score with gusto. At times, the playing (under conductor Alphonse Cemin) is surprisingly jaunty, juxtaposing the bloodthirsty nature of the libretto. The textures of the score (notably composed by Bellini in a hurry, largely made up of recycled music from a previous failed opera) kept surprising me. A set of flowing woodwind solos would be succeeded by the eruption of airy harp-playing.
Romeo and Giulietta are kept apart for the opening third. But they soon contrive a secret meeting, with the help of Lorenzo (Masimba Ushe), the figure familiar as the Apothecary in Shakespeare's rendition. Here we get the pleasure of hearing Cale's Giulietta and Price's Romeo in duet. Price masters the trilling runs of "Sì fuggire", with Cale equally soaring in response.
The climax of the first act is staged as a mass slow-motion brawl as the Montecchi family try to infiltrate Capulet territory, and Romeo's identity is revealed. The curtain falls on a painterly image of riotous action, a Molotov cocktail about to be unleashed on the Capulet stronghold.
Thus the second half sees the set transformed, a burnt-out ruin of the bright diner we saw before, a tattered La Dolce Vita poster reinforcing place and time. Peter Harrison's lighting shifts, too, all shadows and glimmers. It's an effective backdrop for both the aftermath of the battle and the later feigned death of Giulietta. Cale's solos are rapturous, as the plot moves towards the familiar inevitable tragedy.
This is a polished, accessible production whose visual language works in support of the politics of the piece, and whose ensemble, led by a towering Giulietta and an intense, engaging Romeo, don't put a foot wrong.