San Francisco Opera opened its 103rd season with Verdi’s “Rigoletto” in a revival with a lot of star power.
Despite some uneven casting, this “Rigoletto” is a winner, with Music Director Eun Sun Kim’s detailed, passionate conducting at the fore, superb singing on the part of the principals and chorus, and Michael Yeargan’s surreal settings of the licentious 16th century Ducal court in Mantua.
We see little of the lavish court. The focus is on the dark streets where royal gangs rule and the inn where the deformed court jester Rigoletto lives and where his daughter Gilda is taken for the Duke’s pleasure and meets her tragic end.
Baritone Amartuvshin Enkhbat is a Rigoletto with a difference. Rather than be obsessed with contempt and hatred for the court that threatens Gilda, his robust baritone dwells more on his love and his fear for her safety, which makes their pivotal scenes together almost unbearably painful.
Adela Zaharia as Gilda is his match, her high-flying soprano expressing her devotion to her father and love for the Duke in brilliant colors. There is striking chemistry in the three duets with Rigoletto, confirming their connection powerfully.
Tenor Yongzhao Yu as the Duke doesn’t carry his weight at times; his light tenor voice can sound wan and unsupported. Physically he is every inch the rapacious Duke, though, and the “woman is fickle” aria rings with pointed irony.
Elsewhere in the cast, baritone Aleksey Bogdanov as Monterone forcefully lays down the curse that strikes terror into the jester’s heart, bass Peixin Chen is super malevolent as the innkeeper and professional assassin Sparafucile, and mezzo J’nai Bridges is his lusty-voiced sister-in-crime Maddalena.
The lighting design by original lighting designer Mark McCullough and revival designer Justin Partier is magical throughout, the specular storm scene one to remember, and Jose Maria Condemi’s staging is uncluttered and to the point.
San Francisco Opera’s “Rigoletto” continues at 2 p.m. Sept. 13 and Sept. 21 and 7:30 p.m. Sept. 16, Sept. 19, Sept. 24 and Sept. 27 at the War Memorial Opera House, 301 Van Ness Ave., San Francisco. For tickets ($29-$447; $25 for Sept. 13 livestream), call (415) 864-3330 or visit sfopera.com.
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