{"id":114045,"date":"2025-05-05T09:58:13","date_gmt":"2025-05-05T13:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/?p=114045"},"modified":"2025-05-05T12:10:12","modified_gmt":"2025-05-05T16:10:12","slug":"scrutiny-tchaikovskys-music-sympathetic-performances-shine-cocs-uneven-onegin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/2025\/05\/05\/scrutiny-tchaikovskys-music-sympathetic-performances-shine-cocs-uneven-onegin\/","title":{"rendered":"SCRUTINY | Tchaikovsky\u2019s Music And Sympathetic Performances Shine In COC\u2019s Uneven Onegin"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"A
A scene from the Canadian Opera Company\u2019s production of Eugene Onegin, 2025 (Photo: \u00a9 Michael Cooper)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Andrii Kymach: Eugene Onegin; Lauren Fagan: Tatyana; Evan LeRoy Johnson: Lensky; Megan Marino: Olga; Emily Treigle: Filipyevna; Dimitry Ivashchenko: Gremin; Krisztina Szab\u00f3: Madame Larina; Michael Colvin: Monsieur Triquet. COC Orchestra, Speranza Scappucci, Conductor; Peter McClintock, Revival Director. Four Seasons Centre, Toronto. Continues until May 24, 2025; tickets here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

When the Canadian Opera Company acquired and revived Robert Carsen\u2019s 1997 Met production of Eugene Onegin for its 2018 season, most reviews praised it for standing the test of time. The same production, directed by Peter McClintock, has popped up in a few other North Amerian opera houses, where reactions have been more mixed, especially from those lamenting Carsen\u2019s excising of any visual clues to the opera\u2019s Russian setting.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s definitely something to be said there. Had I not known that the production goes back nearly 30 years, I would have taken that deletion as a symptom of post-Ukraine-war derussification campaigns. Clearly there was a different agenda. For better or for worse?<\/p>\n

\"L-R:
L-R: Duncan Stenhouse as Zaretsky, Andrii Kymach as Eugene Onegin (centre), and Evan LeRoy Johnson as Lensky in the Canadian Opera Company\u2019s production of Eugene Onegin, 2025 (Photo: \u00a9 Michael Cooper)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Production<\/h3>\n

Instead of Russian landscapes and aristocratic interiors, the setting is a three-wall \u2018box\u2019 with strikingly spare panels, lit up by colours that reflect not only the times of the day and the passage of time, but also the overall mood of the protagonists. There is plenty of melancholy to be read in the bright autumnal orange of the first scene, echoed by the leaves covering the stage and falling from the ceiling.<\/p>\n

This accords with Carsen\u2019s conception of the opera as a \u2018memory piece\u2019, starting, as it were, from the end. During the orchestral prelude, therefore, we see, behind the scrim, the rejected Onegin browsing through Tatyana\u2019s letter from six years previously. The petals falling from the pages on to the floor soon turn to autumn leaves falling from the skies. This highly effective opening was somewhat undercut on the first night night by ensemble issues between orchestra and chorus (a problem not confined to this scene alone).<\/p>\n

\"Lauren
Lauren Fagan as Tatyana and Andrii Kymach as Eugene Onegin in the Canadian Opera Company\u2019s production of Eugene Onegin, 2025 (Photo: \u00a9 Michael Cooper)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Performances vs Production Design<\/h3>\n

Similarly, the shadowy grey in the final scene reflects the starkness of Tatyana and Onegin\u2019s doomed final encounter. The chemistry between Andrii Kymach, a deeply resonant Onegin, and Lauren Fagan, a sensitive but somewhat under-powered Tatyana, was at its most touching here, though hardly in the same league as the breathtaking Dmitry Hvorostovsky and Ren\u00e9e Fleming in the same production in 2007. Kymach\u2019s final railing against his \u2018pitiable fate\u2019 was heartrending, but Fagan\u2019s sigh of \u2018Alas\u2019, before confessing to her continuing love, paled besides Fleming\u2019s devastating cry.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, the vast emptiness of the scenic background, leaving the vertical space unused, and much of the horizontal, too, makes the characters seem small and distant. Like a memory?<\/p>\n

That\u2019s one of Carsen\u2019s many ideas that work better on paper than on stage. According to his printed notes, he wanted to convey the story as Pushkin does, through the gaze of the prematurely cynical Onegin, rather than that of the young na\u00efve heroine.<\/p>\n

Unfortunately, the greater part of the opera doesn\u2019t easily lend itself to this concept, particularly when its dramatic evolution is frequently interrupted by curtains and a \u2018Pause, please remain seated\u2019 sign. Given that the d\u00e9cor largely consists of single items of furniture, it is hard to understand the need for such lengthy, distracting breaks.<\/p>\n

By contrast, where there is a need for a pause in between the fateful duel between Onegin and his once close friend, Lensky, and the ballroom scene, Carsen perversely opts for seamless continuity. This is all the more frustrating as it follows a particularly well-crafted duel scene, enacted entirely behind the scrim, in pre-dawn hues, and with an outstandingly poignant delivery of Lensky\u2019s aria from Evan LeRoy Johnson. Following the gunshot and Lensky\u2019s fall, Onegin approaches the body, pauses, and the light changes. Unmoved, he steps forward, waiting for his servants to clean and dress him, all this set against the entirety of the Polonaise (played without dancers).<\/p>\n

Whatever the intent, it misfires, the more so because Onegin\u2019s next lines remind the audience that he has been travelling for the past six years. This inflicts serious damage on what we would otherwise infer of Onegin\u2019s character arc and humanisation process, since it suggests that it is only Tatyana\u2019s new-found sophistication and status that spark his conversion.<\/p>\n

\"A
A scene from the Canadian Opera Company\u2019s production of Eugene Onegin, 2025 (Photo: \u00a9 Michael Cooper)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The Music<\/h3>\n

All that aside, it takes more than such dubious interventions to prevent anyone from falling in love with Tchaikovsky\u2019s opera time and time again, especially given such sympathetic performances.<\/p>\n

Megan Marino\u2019s Olga was delightfully carefree and bubbly in acting, warm and velvety in voice, and Dimitry Ivashchenko\u2019s Gremin was the epitome of nobility and grace. Fagan, in her first time tackling the role, responded movingly to the mood-swings of the Letter Scene, even if her voice doesn\u2019t have the soaring quality for its peaks of exaltation. Michael Colvin\u2019s sarcastically comical Triquet was an almost spitting-image of the orange-haired street singer in Visconti\u2019s Death in Venice.<\/p>\n

Final Thoughts<\/h3>\n

Lavish costumes created a counter-balance to the austere setting, making the characters pop out as if in a greeting card. Under Speranza Scappucci\u2019s sometimes over-enthusiastic direction, the orchestra took a while to settle; hopefully they will deal with ensemble and balance problems for the next performances.<\/p>\n

Whether this production has had its day and is ripe for full retirement remains to be seen. For now it can still draw a full house. But it is Tchaikovsky\u2019s supremely humane music that brings the house down.<\/p>\n

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It takes more than original director Robert Carsen’s interventions to prevent anyone from falling in love with Tchaikovsky\u2019s Onegin, especially given such sympathetic performances.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":117,"featured_media":114048,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[41660,43,52,63],"tags":[41913,628,41922,41761,41923],"yst_prominent_words":[6885,8540,8545,23076,23073,15851,8550,23074,23078,23075,16557],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2025\/05\/Copy-of-REVIEW-2025-05-05T095102.309.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9bakr-tFr","amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114045"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/117"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=114045"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114045\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":114059,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/114045\/revisions\/114059"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/114048"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=114045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=114045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=114045"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ludwig-van.com\/toronto\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=114045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}