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The Marriage of Figaro is, metaphorically, a veritable grand tour of Europe. It also has the makings of a classic joke: an Austrian composer and an Italian librettist walk into a bar, armed with a French comedy lampooning longtime class mores in a Spanish setting, ready to set it to music in a new style.
For the fifth time in its nearly 60 years, Portland Opera presents the music of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and the libretto of Lorenzo da Ponte. Adapted from the 1784 play by Pierre Beaumarchais, The Marriage of Figaro debuted at Vienna’s Burgtheater in 1786, and at the Portland Opera in 1971.
Many players in this production made their Portland Opera debuts on opening night at Keller Auditorium on Sat., Oct. 28. Among them are Jesús Vicente Murillo in the title role, as well as Tesia Kwarteng as Marcellina, housekeeper to the doctor Bartolo (Matthew Burns, who will reprise the role in an upcoming production at Inland Northwest Opera in Coeur d’Alene, Idaho).
Richard Ollarsaba, who plays the dastardly Count Almaviva, was the crowd favorite for his entertainingly villainous performance; during intermission, the audience marveled at his great range of facial expressions, and only when he took the stage during the final bow did they rise to their feet.
Even centuries after the opera’s debut, the Count’s entitled attitude and petty melodramas still ring true as a clownish caricature of a greedy aristocrat (because the source material was banned in Vienna, Mozart, being in the court of Holy Roman Emperor Joseph II, and da Ponte had to actually tone down the class-based satire).
In the story, the Count is said to have finally forsaken his longtime practice of stealing into the bedrooms of couples in his service and having his way. Still, he has untoward designs on Figaro’s betrothed, Susanna (Leela Subramaniam), spurring Figaro, Susanna and Countess Almaviva (Laquita Mitchell) to concoct complex stratagems to outwit the Count.
Under the direction of Fenlon Lamb, who has played several roles in this opera (Cherubino as a soprano, then later Marcellina as a mezzo), Subramaniam and Mitchell stand out as the story focuses greatly on their characters’ conflicts with the Count, and the steps they take to challenge him (in Toi Toi Toi, Portland Opera’s magazine, Lamb wrote, “I’ve always been caught up with and incensed by Susanna’s plight and the Countess’s fears and sadness as they both grapple with the consequences of the Count’s unwanted advances”).
One plan is to trick the Count into a romantic rendezvous, but ensuring that he instead meets a disguised Cherubino (Deepa Johnny, who earned almost as much applause as Ollarsaba did at the end of the show). As Cherubino is a lusty teenager who takes every chance he can get to flirt with and feel up every woman in sight, Susanna and the Countess delight in putting dresses and makeup on him.
Though much of the opera is defined by a subtle sharpness in its wit, its greatest strength is knowing when to dial the comedy knob to a broader setting. Hence the Count and Cherubino’s buffoonish ribaldry, the cliffhangers between acts, and mistaken identity gags (especially during a final act largely set in a garden maze) that lead to a coda filled with grace and forgiveness.
The 2023-24 season of the Portland Opera will continue with Enchanted Woods (a Shakespeare-inspired program), The Snowy Day (based on the children’s book by Ezra Jack Keats), and Puccini: In Concert. But for a season opener, it doesn’t come any funnier than The Marriage of Figaro and its elaborate, involved schemes, which ensure that no one (least of all the Count) spoils the occasion.
SEE IT: The Marriage of Figaro plays at the Keller Auditorium, 222 SW Clay St., 503-241-1802, portlandopera.org. 7:30 pm Friday and 2 pm Sunday, Nov. 3 and 5. Tickets start at $70.