Portland Opera

Following last fall's edgy, modernist version of Don Giovanni, the company delivers a Tosca for traditionalists: costumes and sets that explicitly evoke the original production's late 19th-century Roman setting; soapy, melodramatic acting; a taut, sex- and violence-spattered thriller plot tightly directed by Metropolitan opera veteran David Kneuss; and of course Giacomo Puccini’s heart-tuggingly rhapsodic melodies, performed ably and powerfully (sometimes too powerfully for the singers, except for Kara Shay Thomson, whose soprano soars in the title role) by the PO orchestra directed by Joseph Colaneri. In this revival of a production last staged here in 2005, bass Mark Schnaible revels so charismatically in his character Scarpia's unapologetic villainy that we almost root for the bad guy.