Such a pleasure to be invited to review at Greenwich Theatre. A place I have walked past hundreds of times and never been inside. I was not disappointed to find that this is a hidden gem of South London. The theatre has been collaborating with Greenwich Opera who are working with emerging talent and have jointly put this production together.
The Magic Flute composed by Mozart, is an almost mythological and medieval style fairytale including tasks to be undertaken by our hero Tamino in an attempt to win the love of the princess, Pamina. It is a convoluted story of light and dark, good, and bad, freedom, exile, escape, and peace. This production has all opera parts in German and speaking parts in English. There are English subtitles on the screen, however, in the second part the subtitles were being a bit temperamental, but this did not detract from the performance.
This performance of The Magic Flute is a valiant community opera assembled mainly from young semi-professional performers, some of whom are still studying at very prestigious music colleges, with long lists of previous musical backgrounds and performances. The director Valeria Perboni and co-director William Ely have put the production together, with assistance from Ishan Bhadra the musical director and conductor, alongside co-producer Phoebe Whitley.
The space was small but the direction has managed it well and used the aisle for entrancing and exiting through the audience. There were some lovely visual backdrop projections and the small stage was well used by the cast.
At times it was hard for the performers to see the conductor and occasionally the singers were not in tune with the orchestra. Possibly due to not being in sight line with the conductor; leading to moments of inconsistent timings between orchestra and singers. The production could have benefitted from stronger orchestral playing, but as I have said these are several young performers coming together for maybe the first time with a few accomplished notable exceptions. The conductor - Ishan Badra is currently studying for an MA at the Royal academy and has led the orchestra well. It Is important to consider that this was the first night and all will settle down and bed in over the run. But affordable tickets, and a good auditorium with good views of the stage give an easy access to opera.
I was accompanied on this review by my friend, an accomplished Royal Opera House Singer, who was able to give me a few insights about the quality of the singing and performance. I need to say that this run at the Greenwich Theatre has two casts, we saw the Friday cast and it would certainly be interesting to see the alternative cast to compare the performances. The community chorus were very strong indeed and held the performance together.
Pamina- performed by Kennedy Blair Miller sang with a silken quality at the top of her voice and by far was the most enjoyable and likeable of the characters.
Tamino – performed by Gregory Riciu had a good voice, although he did not exude enough leading man/ hero qualities.
Papageno – the Bird Man- performed by Ben Watkins – was really good and was much more at ease in the operatic stage than the younger ones. He held the role throughout and commanded the stage alongside Papagena (Rose Rands) with her strong voice and good characterisation. We both felt that she could have been cast in a bigger role.
The three ladies (Antonia Kocharova, Megan Artemova Thomas, and Lizzie Hawes) were a well put together ensemble with a matching quality of voices that worked well together. They acted out the parts well and developed a style and sound that made their performances memorable.
Queen of the night – performed by Meliza Metzger requires some high notes as part of the role. Meliza has a strong powerful voice, but needed more stage presence to convince the audience that she was a powerful queen.
Sarastro (David Banbury) has a notable voice.
Speaker - Charles Naylor is a seasoned operatic professional who although having one of the minor roles in this production actually shone and would be an ideal role model for the company.
Monostatos – (Ash Howard) gave a strong solid vocal performance.
The three Spirits is usually sung by young boy trebles. In this production they have been assembled form three amazing women with good voices, timing, and movement. These three lovely spirits are performed by Emily Varney, Antonia Thwaites, Jessica Harper.
It was an enjoyable evening and as I said earlier, this production will definitely settle down and improve at each performance. Runs from Friday 20th June- 22nd June
Reviewer - Penny Curran
On - 20.06.2025
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