Rigoletto
Kicking it Vegas Style In the 2013 Metropolitan Opera’s new production of Rigoletto, directed by Michael Mayer, when the Duke sings the famous aria “La donna è mobile,” the indecisive woman he describes may as well be lady luck. Mayer makes his operatic debut revamping the action of Verdi’s 16th-century setting to 1960s Las Vegas. His directing goal is to make the greed and corruption of the characters urgent. Mayer casts the Duke (Piotr Beczala) as a singer, casino runner and leader of a Jazz type group. Rigoletto (Zeljko Lucic), ordinarily a deformed hunchbacked court jester, has a less clear role, but his social status is concise. While the plot runs on acts of payback, Rigoletto believes his downfall is caused by a curse from Monterone, usually portrayed by an elderly man, here an Arab. Some of the staging seems awkward and unrealistic, including men singing their secret gossip about Rigoletto into a microphone. Usually when you’re trying to keep a secret you wouldn’t sing it into a microphone. There is also a sense that Mayer is overly cautious to the needs of singers. Gilda and Rigoletto could sing to each other more, sometimes it felt as if they didn’t even know each other. In the opera’s most crucial scene, Mayer’s vision fails horribly. Rigoletto is supposed to enter the palace in his jester’s costume, wild and singing a tune. In Mayer’s version, Lucic walks in wearing a raincoat, singing a tune, looking weirdly out of place. While this production had some misplaced scenes it also had its redeeming qualities. In Scene 2 instead of shifting the action to an alley outside Rigoletto’s house, as the libretto indicates, Mayer keeps Rigoletto at the casino after everyone leaves. As he thinks of his daughter, Gilda, whom he is trying to keep safe, Rigoletto is haunted by Monterone’s words. While the vision of the opera lacked at times the singing remained superb. The Duke (Beczala) deserved his superior status, his rich voice flowing to