New Zealand Opera's La Cenerentola is a captivating night in theatreland.
Just last week, director Lindy Hume was describing Rossini as a genius who didn't muck around. Nor has she with her vivid take on his 1817 fairytale.
Dan Potra's spectacular Don Magnifico Emporium, a fold-out Panavision Curiosity Shoppe, draws gasps from the audience. We had already been taken to a magnificent library and an elegantly sculpted palace garden lay ahead, not to mention foggy London streets populated by cheeky chimney sweeps.
Taiaroa Royal's hip choreography is a bonus, with an umbrella number that could slip into Singing in the Rain. If that good philosopher Alidoro (compellingly played by Ashraf Sewailam) might be credited with bringing Rossini's heroine Angelina into the light, then Matthew Marshall's brilliant lighting makes a theatrical coup of her first transformation.
Wyn Davies, conducting a well-primed Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra, adds the bubbles and fizz that this musical Prosecco needs. The score is substantially complete tonight, apart from the occasional cutting back of coloratura and the brutal chopping of Luca Agolini's plot-spinning recitatives.
