Review: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM, Opera Holland Park

With June being a prime time to get hitched, now should be as good as any time to dig up and put on stage Felix Mendelssohn’s 1842 incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a score which features the famous Wedding March. Despite the play’s themes, this melding of classical sound and drama from historical performance ensemble Figure is from magical.

The pairing of the German composer’s work and Shakespeare’s text was popular in the late-19th century and it’s not particularly hard to see why. Mendelssohn's music captures the whimsical and ethereal atmosphere of the magical realm while also highlighting the emotional depth of the human characters. From the delicate and ethereal fairy music to the majestic "Wedding March", his compositions brilliantly evoke the fantastical elements of the story while enhancing its dramatic moments with evocative melodies and rich harmonies.

Its rare these days to see this combination on stage so Figure’s attempt to recreate this experience is an intriguing one, especially in the open-air venue used by Opera Holland Park for their summer season. Unlike the majority of opera venues which keep the musicians out of sight, the stage here is akin to a pentagonal polo mint with the orchestra sitting in the middle and actors performing around them. It’s an unusual setting that allows companies to have actors positioned in the foreground in front of the audience and on a longer stage at the back while moving between the two.

Unfortunately, bad luck and poor choices plague this production from Figure director Samuel Rayner and co-producer and conductor Frederick Waxman. Having the actors wear wireless mics certainly helps with projection in such a vast auditorium but, when the mics fail (as they did on occasion, most noticeably and painfully for Titania’s opening speech), those at the back of the seated area struggled to hear what was being said. Even when they are working, the mics amplify the poor vocal delivery. Much of the company – and especially the Mechanicals – rush out their words, sprinting over some of the finest parts of the text. 

Rayner’s decision to have many of the most important scenes take place behind the orchestra is a frustrating one. While the musicians don’t obscure the view, having to peer into the middle distance to take in the actors is a less than engaging affair. There is some dynamism when they move to the foreground but too little to really pull us into this enchanted world.

The acting itself is very much a mixed bag. Anna Leong Brophy stands out with her pitch-perfect delivery of Titania/Hippolyta, an articulate and endearing performance at odds with the more exuberant direction given to Joelle Taylor’s Puck and Jay Mailer’s Bottom; there’s a feeling that Taylor and Mailer would thrive in their comic roles if they were allowed to occasionally take a breath and express their lines through more than the gerbil-speed diction they are asked to use. Eleanor Sutton is excellent, making the most of Helena’s forthright determination to bag her man and her desperate confusion when she is courted by both Lysander and Demetrius, as is Hannah Rose Caton opposite her as Hermia.

The huge white columns of fabric hanging at the back of Emma Hollow’s set are cleverly used to suggest trees and structures and are one of the most successful elements of this production. The lighting is generally prosaic, deployed more for mood than to enliven or underscore. Waxman’s laidback reading of Mendelssohn’s score is boosted by some delightful singing from sopranos Rowan Pierce and Madison Nonoa and the children’s choir from Theatre Peckham Academy Glee Club.

There’s no doubt that there is heaps of potential here but, at least on this occasion, the sum of all these parts doesn’t add up to more than the whole.

Opera Holland Park's summer season continues until 12 August.

Photo credit: Nick Rutter
 

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