Václav Kaslik directed this popular co-production of Da Ponte and Mozart. The question of the faithfulness of women and the mistrust of men, are the key in the libretto. I do not know of course how the opening night in 1790 was performed but this recording of the Salzburger Festspiele in 1969 is of a better amateur production. There is a basic rule for performing a comedy: take it absolutely serious! The wonderful humor and weakness of the characters are in the libretto and score; no need to overdo it in acting or funny faces.
Karl Böhm directs and has -much to my surprise- good and fast tempi most of the time; which is a nice change from his slow and Wagnerian style of conducting -although Böhm made a few cuts in the music (i.e. Finale act I) and I don't understand those decisions. If Mozart would have wanted things cut out of his score, he would have done it himself! And he didn't, so leave it like it is please.
The singing with orchestra is done by play-back and the singers have a lot of trouble with that (the recitativa are done life) but I do keep in mind it was 1969 and in classical music the lip-sinc was not that common yet. Especially Gundula Janowitz (Dorabella) just opens and closes her mouth at random. Christa Ludwig tries to make something out of her Fiordiligi but is only partially successful as her acting skills lack interpretation. Alva and Prey are not convincing as Ferrando and Guglielmo; they behave more like bored students with nothing else to do than to manipulate women. I was pleasantly surprised by Walter Berry's Alfonso as his faces muscles where not making so much overtime as usual. Olivera Miljakovic is quite nice as Despina but that is of course a grateful part. Her pitch as Notary was not an octave lower as in the score but higher! Again I question Böhms decision in this. Why o why?
The staging was compensation for lack of understanding what the opera is about. Kaslik had no idea what to do, so he gave the poor singers so much work to do that decent acting and singing was impossible. The 'plot' is not that women turn to other man the moment their fiancés are gone but about betrayal, mistrust, insecurity and human weaknesses. For all parties involved, not just the women.
Pieter
