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Mezzo Costa-Jackson was in her element. Contradictory, cruel, passionate, vulnerable, she can do the emotional equivalent of turning on a dime.
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The plan was for Vancouver Opera to end its latest season with a bang — five performances of George Bizet’s greatest hit Carmen.
To facilitate such a run, the two principal roles were double cast, Sarah Mesko and Alok Kumar as Carmen and Don José on opening night and for three subsequent performances, Carolyn Sproule and Matthew White in the same roles for two other shows. But nothing in the performing arts is ever certain; Sproule withdrew at the last minute from the production. Serendipitously, Ginger Costa-Jackson was able to reprise one of her signature roles as Sproule’s replacement.
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Costa-Jackson delivered a riveting Carmen for VO back in 2014, in Joel Ivany’s impressive staging; in 2018 she repeated the role for Seattle Opera. Sets and costumes from that production are recycled for this production, which gives off a sort of Franco-1940s vibe. Rachel Peake, who directed Bizet’s earlier The Pearl Fishers for VO last season, creates a cogent if fairly conventional staging. There is a bit too much under-motivated stair climbing and cute gimmicks for my taste, but her vision is solid and the tawdry nature of the tale certainly comes through.
Both orchestra and chorus could have been crisper in Sunday’s sold-out matinee performance, but the essence of Bizet’s astonishing orchestrations was there. A bit of rawness in the sizable onstage chorus was perfectly acceptable: these are factory workers, soldiers, and smugglers, after all, not the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
All four principal roles are effective. Young baritone Nathan Keoghan sang Escamillo, the swaggering toreador who gets one of the most memorable numbers in all opera, delivered his part with brash assurance. Soprano Jonelle Sills makes a particularly fine Micheila, the opera’s good girl, here decked out complete with white gloves and a handbag. Sills’s clear, agile voice is charming, and she brings a coy but appropriate whiff of erotic desire to her portrayal.
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I felt it took tenor Matthew White an act or two to come into his own, but by Act 3 — an excellent, taut example of dramatic opera at its best — he was demonstrating his potential. His voice isn’t exceptionally big, and his work in the spoken dialogue needed more presence, but his sound is clear and his musicality considerable. By Act Four his portrayal of toxic masculinity driven by lust, obsession, and humiliation made convincing dramatic sense. For the opera comique style spoken dialogue, Alain Coulombre takes the laurels, even if his singing part is minuscule.
But it’s not titled Carmen for nothing. Mezzo Costa-Jackson was in her element. Contradictory, cruel, passionate, vulnerable, she can do the emotional equivalent of turning on a dime. Her instrument is powerful and dark; her understanding of the complexities of the role second to none. She was a tad young to be playing Carmen a decade ago; now she exudes confidence and authority. She rightly sees Carmen as larger than life, and plays her accordingly.
Length and 19th century operatic conventions notwithstanding, Carmen has made new friends for opera for a century and a half now. Tickets are already in short supply for the three remaining performances, May 2 and 4 with Sarah Mesko singing the title role and Costa-Jackson in the final matinee of the run on May 5.
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