The Met’s ‘Falstaff,’ set in the ’50s

This updating is more harmful than, say, a Rigoletto set in Las Vegas, because a traditional Mantua Rigoletto is always close by. Falstaff, on the other hand, is less frequently mounted, and this consortium of the world’s major opera houses have made it the standard for our time and, thanks to economics, for many years to come.

I understand the argument that the work transcends time, having been set nearly two centuries before Shakespeare. Verdi’s music didn’t copy that of the Tudor era, nor Shakespeare’s. Yet I remain unconvinced that Verdi’s bubbling brio reflects life in the 1950s.

In Carsen’s Falstaff, the Garter Inn has become a hotel bedroom, where Sir John is attended by butlers and room-service waiters. The outdoor garden of the Ford family is now the interior of a large restaurant. And the room for the romantic assignation in Ford’s house now has become a kitchen with avocado-green cabinets and a Formica dinette set. Instead of playing a mandolin, Alice turns on a radio.

Like the Marx Brothers

The Carsen conception contains many clever moments, and the principals execute their intricate moves with precision. In the kitchen scene, Falstaff takes a turkey from the oven and slices it for sharing with Alice, but serves himself a grotesquely large portion, which is genuinely funny. When Ford enters with his henchmen, they empty all cabinets, tossing plates and utensils. It’s illogical to suspect that Falstaff could be hiding within such small overhead cabinets, but the action is crafted to elicit audience laughter, which it does. Consider it as a homage to the overcrowded ship-cabin scene conjured up by the Marx Brothers in their 1935 film, A Night At the Opera.

The worst jumble is Act III, which depends on Falstaff’s superstitious belief in the medieval legend of a horned hunter. Of course this notion was utterly irrelevant to the 1950s, yet Carsen couldn’t devise a substitute for it. He also placed Falstaff drying out from his Thames-dunking in a barn, yet a waiter appeared therein to take Sir John’s drink order. Preposterously, Carsen also created a forest scene that included large tables (with white linen tablecloths) on a wood floor.

The only sane way to approach this mismatch is to sit back and enjoy the music and acting, which I did. This Falstaff provides a pleasant alternative approach to the classic, one that’s fun to watch once or twice. But it’s not Shakespeare.

Popping the cork

Ambrogio Maestri, tall as well as stout, dominates the proceedings superbly as Falstaff. His facial expressions can really be appreciated in close-up on a wide screen. Savor him, for example, peeling the foil from a wine bottle with his teeth, then inserting the corkscrew and popping the cork in perfect synchronization with Verdi’s music.

Maestri’s voice is more lyrical than most Falstaffs, yet it exudes power when needed. In his first-act "Questo e il mio regno! Lo ingrandiro”! (“This is my kingdom and I will make it grow”), Maestri’s voice blooms on a gorgeous high F on the word regno. He’s sympathetic as a deluded fool and a vainglorious inept lover, yet capable of moments of grace and elegance.

Angela Meade makes an attractively coquettish Alice Ford, displaying superb comic skills and a playful sexiness that she hasn’t revealed in previous roles. Her singing soars, and it’s capped off by a delightful trill in the outdoor scene just before Verdi’s final fugue. Stephanie Blythe is a conniving Mistress Quickly with her richly booming mezzo voice.

Levine returns

Lisette Oropesa is an uncommonly fine Nanetta, singing with airy lyricism. Her last-act aria climaxes with a nice ascending scale to high A on which Oropesa’s voice swells sublimely. As Master Ford, Baritone Franco Vassallo acts well and sings his big monologue with a ringing top, but his bottom three notes fade out weakly. Vassallo presents Ford as a smarmy mobster in costume and posturing, which doesn’t fit with the classiness of his wife.

This opera requires ten solo singers with acting ability, and all the remaining parts were decently cast, although Paolo Fanale’s Fenton lacked the caressing pianissimi that other tenors have brought to the role.

James Levine is back on the podium after two years of spinal problems. His face beams and his gestures seem strong, although he remains seated in a mechanical chair. Levine’s mastery of this score is as robust as ever. Verdi used French horns more in Falstaff than in his earlier operas, to indicate Ford’s fear of cuckolding during his monologue, and then again in the prelude to Act II. This is a moment of special beauty, led by a solo low horn. The chorus, trained by Donald Palumbo, is a major factor in the beautiful final act.