Tchaikovsky: Eugene Onegin (Opus Arte: OABD7100D) [Blu-ray] [2012]

As one would expect this is technically very fine. Jansons and the orchestra play beautifully and generally the singing is very good too. The camera work and costumes are wonderful and if only the Director had paid more attention to Tchaikovsky it could have been a wonderful production. Unfortunately the Norwegian director managed to persuade De Nederlandse Opera to do it his way. Jansons was clearly sceptical in the doco but finally came round to accepting the numerous oddities in this wierd production. Where to start? Spreading the action across different times with a mixture of old Russia, the USSR and a modern opera house just did not work for me. Getting Onegin to write Tatyana's letter was even odder, especially when he was asleep in a double bed in her room! The stage effects with sliding doors and odd characters wandering about, (including a bear, some cosmonauts, ballet dancers, - one of whom appears to make a homosexual assault on Onegin, some time-shift doubles and soviet athletes), I found colourful but with no relevance to the story. The vicious attack on the well-meaning Triquet at the ball is unexplained and again pointless.

Both the ladies sing well but are really too mature in appearance for their roles on Blu-ray although this would be overlooked in the opera house for a one-off performance. Onegin is directed to act as if he is a bit half-witted and although a fine singer I did not care for his portrait of Onegin.

The rush of modernised productions has a place in the opera house and some, such as the extraordinary Spanish Ring, have a well deserved place on Blu-ray, but media companies do need to ask themselves what will sell for repeat viewing and I submit too many recent Blu-ray releases are unlikely to make much money. This is not as bad as the recent Flying Dutchman and will get a lot of mileage from the colourful costumes and orchestral playing but with just a little moderation it could have been so much better.

What's most impressive about Eugene Onegin - both from Tchaikovsky's viewpoint as well as its original author Pushkin's - is how it manages to compact all those diverse, contradictory, deeply romantic and sometimes self-destructive features of the Russian character into what on the surface seems a simple romantic story of love and rejection. It's full of passion and character so it's surprising then how coldly and calculatingly the opera can often be put across. That will often depend on the interpretation of the conductor and stage director and on how much emphasis to give to Tchaikovsky's score, but as far as this De Nederlandse production goes, with Mariss Jansons conducting and Stefan Herheim directing, it's a passionate and expansive account of the opera, though one that many will inevitably feel takes too many liberties with the libretto.

As far as the staging goes, the young Norwegian director does place the figures into somewhat irregular configurations. You'll see that from the outset as Onegin walks onto the stage a scene before he should be formally introduced, looking thoroughly confused and walking moreover into what looks like a hotel lobby, with an elevator and a revolving door, where Tanya and her family are together. Similarly, there are few of the usual separations of characters in scenes that one would be accustomed to. Even when Tanya should be writing her famous love letter to the young man she has just been introduced to, it's staged here with Onegin actually writing the letter, while her husband, Prince Gremin, lies in bed behind them. This could be thoroughly confusing for anyone who is unfamiliar with the opera, but it will not make a lot of sense to anyone who is familiar with the work and who would be quite happy to see it played out in the traditional linear manner.

The concept applied here, of course (although it might not be that obvious), is that the figures are reflecting back on the events from an older perspective, and the setting picks up on the mirroring of the situations. That's most evident when Onegin directs his rejection of Tatyana to a silent younger girl in a white dress, while Krassimira Stoyanova, who actually sings the role of Tatyana, wearing a red dress (there may be some colour coding to reflect the differing perspectives) looks on as a spectator on her own past. Whether you consider that this distorts the intentions of Eugene Onegin or whether you feel that it opens it up underlying themes within the work will obviously depend on your taste, but the motivations of the director, inspired or misguided though they may be judged to be, are at least derived from close attention paid to the work itself.

It does however add another level of complication to a work that is already enriched in emotions and in their peculiar Russian expression and result in some the bizarre touches that might be considered pushing an already quite eccentric production - such as Onegin's second at the duel actually being a bottle of wine - a little too far. Act III's Polonaise attempts to bring in an historical 'tableau vivant' of all walks of Russian life, with a dancing bear, Cosmonauts, Russian gymnasts, Swan Lake dancers, royalty and religious leaders, Red Army troops and sailors, folk dancers, serfs and Prince Gremin heading up a Russian mafia outfit, and if all that sounds like it has nothing to do with Eugene Onegin, you'd be entitled to think so and decide that this is not a production for you, but at the same time it can be seen as historically being a part of everything Russian that is enshrined within the essence of Pushkin and Tchaikovsky's work.

What I think is beyond question however is that Jansons and Herheim bring out the full latent potential of Eugene Onegin here, without restraint, but also without over-emphasis. Regardless of whether the concept makes rational sense or appeals to personal taste, this is a passionate and moving account of the work on a musical and a dramatic level. The singing is also exceptionally good here. You might like a younger person singing Tatyana, but a younger singer couldn't sing this role half as well. It needs a mature voice, and Krassimira Stoyanova`s is wonderfully toned, controlled with impeccable technique and emotionally expressive. Bo Skovhus brings a great intensity also to this Onegin who is tortured by his nature of being Russian. He's not the strongest voice in the role, but he sings it well. Mikhail Petrenko's Prince Gremin and Andrej Dunaev's Lensky are also worthy of the production. The very fine team of the Chorus of the De Nederlandse opera provide their usual sterling work.

Blu-ray specifications are all in order. The video quality is good, the picture clear, even though it is often dark on the stage and there are some slight fluctuations in brightness adjustment. The PCM Stereo and DTS HD-Master Audio 5.1 audio tracks are strong and impressive, with a wonderful tone. Extras on the disc include a Cast Gallery and a 30 minute documentary feature where the director explains - not always convincingly and certainly always clearly to conductor Jansons - his thought-process for the work, with backstage interviews, rehearsals and a look at the costume designs. The booklet contains an essay examining the work and the production and includes a synopsis. The disc is BD50, 16:9, 1080i full HD. Subtitles are in English, French, German, Spanish, Italian and Dutch.