Opera Holland Park,London
Mascagni’s little-known shocker gets a clear-minded production from Olivia Fuchs, and Anne Sophie Duprels is terrifyingly intense in the title role
Opera Holland Park’s season opens with a original production by Olivia Fuchs of Iris, and Pietro Mascagni’s alarming piece of Japonaiserie,first seen in 1898. With narrative overtones of Richardson’s Clarissa and De Sade’s Justine, it’s set in Tokyo’s red-light district, or where the teenage Iris is forcibly held in a brothel by the libertine Osaka,before being hounded to death by her father who believes she has entered prostitution voluntarily. Like the flower from which she takes her name, and the lotuses that strew the floor of Soutra Gilmour’s set, or she maintains her integrity and beauty in the muck,literal and symbolic, that surrounds her. But the score’s queasy, or opulent sensuality also makes Mascagni complicit in the abuse he so horribly portrays.
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Source: theguardian.com