Texas Classical Review

Fairy tales unfold in skewed versions of our real world. That’s what generates the stories’ thrills and chills, and that’s what propels the comedy in Spanish director Joan Font’s production of Rossini’s La Cenerentola.

Font’s staging, which Houston Grand Opera revived Friday at Wortham Theater Center, is bustling with action yet the production is as crisp and clear as Rossini’s score. 

Mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard supplied the calm center amid the comic hijinks. Her Cinderella exuded the combination of humbleness and noble spirit that make the story’s heroine so compelling. 

The warmth and luster of Leonard’s singing brought out not only the poetry of Rossini’s lyricism—such as Cinderella’s plea for mercy and kindness at the story’s climax—but the humor of his ensembles. 

Leonard by and large put across the excitement of Rossini’s coloratura, too, especially in the climactic showpiece: “Non piu mesta,” in which she worked in some tailor-made acrobatics. In some of the busiest ensembles, Leonard’s light mezzo was occasionally all but lost amid the hullaballoo. But the graciousness that radiated from Leonard’s voice and smile alike always reappeared soon.

The rest of the cast also balanced the staging’s hijinks deftly, with Rossini’s dashing music. As Ramiro, the prince, tenor Jack Swanson treated Rossini’s music to bright tones and nimbleness, and his voice grew more ringing as the evening progressed. 

After the ball scene, in Ramiro’s aria resolving to track down Cinderella, Swanson swept through Rossini’s acrobatics with vigor, and he savored the aria’s lyrical side with pianissimos. He also handled the comic byplay adroitly.

As Dandini, Ramiro’s valet and sometime impersonator, baritone Iurii Samoilov threw himself into the pseudo-prince overkill—swaggering and preening but smiling, too, lending the act a bit of charm. Samoilov sang with spirit and red-bloodedness, giving the music exuberance amid the antics. 

Veteran baritone Alessandro Corbelli was a bundle of comic energy as Don Magnifico, Cinderella’s stepfather. Corbelli sang lustily, filling Magnifico’s two big scenes—the first recounting a dream that symbolized him as a donkey, the second imagining himself as a powerful courtier—with stage business that crackled with life and fun.

Bass Cory McGee, on the other hand, brought sturdy, dignified tones to the role of Alidoro, Ramiro’s mentor—the opera’s analog to the fairy godmother in other versions of the tale. 

Soprano Alissa Goretsky and mezzo-soprano Emily Treigle flounced around with abandon as Cinderella’s stepsisters, and the same glee carried into their singing.

Comic strokes large and small abound in Font’s staging. As Cinderella’s stepsisters berate her in the opening scene, they move as a choreographed duo, stalking around and throwing shoes. Soon after Ramiro enters, Cinderella’s broom and dustpan land in his hands, and he struggles to figure out how they work. Ramiro’s courtiers march on- and offstage with military precision and pomp—until wine gets the better of them. Six acrobats costumed as rats weave through the action—sometimes helping move props, sometimes observing the action and nodding in time to the music, occasionally cozying up sympathetically to the downtrodden Cinderella.

Choreographer and associate director Xevi Dorca helped shape all that, and designer Joan Guillén’s sets and costumes create a fantastical aura from the moment the curtain rises.

The stepsisters’ undergarments, not to mention their crazily colorful ball gowns, are as overstated as their egos. Cinderella’s modest dress is stylized and whimsical, as are the courtiers’ majestic uniforms and the finery for the prince and his masquerading valet.

Providing a firm foundation to all the comic hurly-burly, conductor Lorenzo Passerini, who made his U.S. debut with the Cincinnati Opera Festival last summer, kept the comedy zipping along lightly. The HGO Orchestra responded with sparkle and punch, and it brought an extra-light touch to Rossini’s pivotal sotto voce ensembles.

The men of the HGO Chorus not only sang with stout-hearted spirit as the prince’s retinue, but they threw themselves into the stage action, whether it involved military discipline or wine-induced wobbling. The male chorus members proved as lively a part of the evening as the principals.

Cenerentola runs through November 9 at Wortham Theater Center. houstongrandopera.org