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The Suburban Don Juan Piacenza
Teatro Municipale
01/23/2026 - & January 25*, 2026
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Don Giovanni, K. 527
Claudia Pavone (Donna Anna), Carmela Remigio (Donna Elvira), Désirée Giove (Zerlina), Erik Werba (Don Giovanni), Tommaso Barea (Leporello), Marco Ciaponi (Don Ottavio), Alberto Petricca (Masetto), Renzo Ran (Il Commendatore)
Coro del Teatro Municipale di Piacenza, Corrado Casati (Chorus Master), Andrés Jesús Gallucci (harpsichord), Orchestra Filarmonica Italiana, Enrico Pagano (conductor)
Andrea Bernard (stage director), Alberto Beltrame (sets), Elena Beccaro (costumes), Marco Alba (lights)
M. Werba (© Gianni Cravedi)
Described by German Romantic author E.T.A. Hoffmann (1776‑1822) as “the opera of operas,” Don Giovanni is considered by many the greatest example of this art form, thanks to Mozart’s splendid score and to Lorenzo Da Ponte’s brilliant libretto. The three Mozart/Da Ponte collaborations and some of Richard Strauss’ with poet Hugo von Hofmannsthal are the only operas whose libretti are as good as their score. Indeed, Da Ponte’s libretto can be appreciated on several levels, thus offering a plethora of possibilities to a talented, inspired director.
Of the half dozen operas staged by Italian director Andrea Bernard that I have seen in recent years, none has been brilliant, whether we examine Lucrezia Borgia in Trieste and Florence or his Ernani in Valencia. His staging of Lucrezia Borgia for Trieste in 2020 held some promise, but its updated staging in Florence a few months ago showed net deterioration. Bernard typically has a couple of good ideas, but then milks them ad nauseam, thereby diluting other important aspects of the opera. Given the richness of Don Giovanni, such an approach augured poorly.
Bernard’s big idea in his contemporary treatment of Don Giovanni was two‑fold. Firstly, the legendary seducer is a married man with a young child, a boy. His wife is played by the soprano who sings Donna Elvira. His seductions are secret affairs he has on the side. In a barn adjoining his home, he keeps a record of his extra‑marital affairs in thick office files. His more recent endeavours are kept under wooden boards in the barn. Like some serial killers, he keeps mementos of his conquests: a wedding gown, a school uniform, a sleeping gown, a dress, and so on. Leporello is an acolyte rather than a servant. The relationship between the two is ambiguous, with some sexual undertones. Much of this is revealed to the public in an enactment of a scene in Giovanni’s domestic life during the overture.
Secondly, Bernard suggests the boy can be seen through a different lens, that he could in fact be young Giovanni, the son of a cheating sex addict. The domineering mother and the absent father would then be Bernard’s explanation of Don Giovanni’s affliction. A rather tired and not overly insightful psychoanalysis, Herr Doktor Bernard!
Fortunately, the cast was vastly superior to the staging, and rendered the performance highly enjoyable. Soprano Claudia Pavone was an excellent choice as Donna Anna, and is endowed with a beautiful timbre and facility in her high register. Her voice contrasted well with that of Donna Elvira’s lyric soprano. She managed the technical difficulties of the role with brio. Her arias “Or sai chi l’onore” and “Non mi dir” were the vocal pinnacles of the evening. If only she had been given better direction in her acting, hers would have been an absolutely stunning Donna Anna. Her middle class 1970s Donna Anna lacked a noblewoman’s imperiousness. Part of Anna’s appeal to a seducer is her pride. Bernard’s Anna was a nice suburban woman indistinguishable from other middle class women or Don Giovanni’s own wife. This Giovanni is no connaisseur but a mere glutton.
Having made Giovanni an unmasked guest at Anna’s party at the opening of the opera, Bernard removed a major question: was Anna a willing partner or was she a victim of rape. It can only be the latter in this staging. The other haunting question that usually renders Anna the most interesting character in the opera is her guilt. Her hysterical lamentations and overdone grief are often seen as a reaction to her own guilt. This argument only holds had Anna been a willing partner, enjoying an ongoing tryst with Don Giovanni that was coincidentally interrupted by mere chance by her father. Had Giovanni been a masked intruder unmasked by Anna’s father, Il Commendatore, then Giovanni’s murdering him is collateral damage to protect his identity. Here, it is not the case, as Giovanni was not disguised. Thus, from the opening of the opera, the murder is gratuitous and Giovanni is a psychopath with whom the public cannot possibly identify.
Lyric soprano Carmela Remigio is an affecting singer whose expressiveness is as appealing as her beautiful voice. Recently heard as Caterina Cornaro at Bergamo’s Donizetti Festival, Remigio is galvanizing. I’ve admired her Donna Elvira in several productions, including Turin in 2018, Parma in 2023 and Venice in 2024. Remigio owns the role, thanks to her immense expressivity. Technically, the role is less challenging than Donna Anna, but requires more acting and charisma. Donna Elvira is more sensitive than either Anna or Zerlina, and she truly loved Don Giovanni.
Now in her early fifties, Remigio’s voice is still glorious, but there was a slight shrillness in her first aria, “Chi mi dice mai?” which fortunately did not recur afterwards. Thanks to her great talent as an actor, she managed to convey Elvira’s vulnerability throughout the opera. Her Act II aria, “Mi tradì quell’alma ingrata,” possibly Mozart’s most beautiful soprano aria, was the most moving moment in the performance thanks to her timbre, technique and clear diction.
Thanks to his charisma and acting, Markus Werba was an appealing Don Giovanni, despite a relatively small voice. Quite appropriately, a small‑voiced Don Giovanni matches Bernard’s petty suburban cheating husband. I first saw Markus Werba’s Don Giovanni in Damiano Michieletto’s remarkable staging of the opera for Venice in 2023. His interpretation has somewhat improved since, though given the poor staging, one is not totally convinced. The Act I champagne aria, “Fin ch’han del vino” was vocally excellent but lacked the required frenzy. Act II’s “Deh, vieni alla finestra” was charming, but with bland staging, lost its effectiveness.
Though the Austrian baritone’s diction is excellent, he doesn’t make the most of his words, especially the recitatives. Phrases like “E un’impostura della gente plebea”, “Chi a una sola è fedele, verso l’altre è crudele” and others were missed opportunities to portray Don Giovanni’s essence. They were well‑pronounced, but without any particular inflection. What a waste! More than with any other composer, in Mozart the recitatives are all‑important, as they reveal a good deal about the character, more than do the arias.
Mozart’s choosing of Leporello to perform in the same register as Don Giovanni was not coincidental. Though a lower basso cantante register would augment Leporello’s comic element, the two need to have the same register so that Leporello may be Don Giovanni’s mirror image (either an alter ego or conscience). Indeed, many productions choose to emphasize this aspect. However, in the present production, Leporello is a mere acolyte with little reflection. This is a pity, as Italian baritone Tommaso Barea is a superb actor. With such talent, much more could have been achieved. Barea is an ideal Leporello, with a booming, beautiful baritone of a darker hue than Werba’s. Endowed with a natural comic verve and the capacity to make the most of his text, more emphasis ought to have been put on this character. Had this Leporello been better directed, Barea would have stolen the show, given his charisma. Fortunately for Werba, he was not.
Lyric soprano Désirée Giove is a rising young singer who a year ago sang the Celestial Voice in Naples’ Don Carlo. She quickly rose to Glauce in Medea last December, also in Naples. Endowed with a beautiful lyric soprano radiating youth and femininity, Giove was this production’s Zerlina. Despite the excellence of Pavone and Remigio, Giove was a worthy rival. Usually sung by a light mezzo or a soprano leggero, Zerlina is often a lacklustre role. But in Giove, we have a radiantly sensual woman, not a child bride, at par with the other two women. Giove managed to portray bang on Don Giovanni’s favourite prey, “la giovin principiante”. The often irritating Act I aria “Batti, batti, o bel Masetto” was a delight, while the Act II aria “Vedrai carino” was charm personified, devoid of the inherent sexual innuendo.
Italian lyric tenor Marco Ciaponi is another young rising star. Heard in 2023 as Prunier in Turin’s production of La rondine, Ciaponi was a truly impressive Don Ottavio. Endowed with a beautiful timbre, clear diction and excellent technique, Ciaponi’s voice is perfect for Mozart. His renditions of Ottavio’s two difficult arias, Act I’s “Dalla sua pace” and Act II’s “Il mio tesoro” were exquisite. At the end of the performance, Ciaponi elicited huge applause, rarely lavished on those singing this role. One would have liked more depth in the interpretation, but I suspect little direction was given to the young tenor. Questions such as Ottavio’s tepid passion for Anna or her lack of enthusiasm for Ottavio were neither elucidated nor hinted at. He was not made to look particularly older than Anna, nor was he effete, mannered, or effeminate. Therefore, their mysteriously protracted engagement remained a mystery.
Alberto Petricca and Renzo Ran were competent in their smaller roles of Masetto and Il Commendatore. Petricca exuded the required youth and impetuousness but Ran’s bass was not cavernous, as one expects in this role. Bernard dispensed with Il Commendatore’s statue in the cemetery scene rendering Leporello’s “O statua gentillissima” nonsensical. Instead of a statue, Don Giovanni and Leporello find some bones to which they sing. The dinner scene was a picnic in Giovanni’s barn, in sharp contrast to the original setting with lavish surroundings, an onstage orchestra and a sumptuous meal. This low budget setting rendered Giovanni’s “Io spendo i miei danari” ridiculous. With the absence of an ominous statue dragging Don Giovanni to Hell, this was one underwhelming staging of the dinner scene.
Enrico Pagano’s conducting did not impress some in the public who expressed their dissatisfaction at the end of the performance. Personally, I didn’t agree. Pagano adopted appropriate tempi and provided support for his singers in the most treacherous sections such as Anna’s “Non mi dir.” The overture was slower than usual, possibly to convey gravitas. My only reproach is that he didn’t allow the singers to savour the recitatives, which were performed rather hurriedly. This was our loss, as Mozart’s recitatives can be even more significant than his arias, in terms of character development.
One major theme in Don Giovanni ignored by Bernard was the vastly different profiles of the three women, Donna Anna, Donna Elvira and Zerlina. It was not by chance that Da Ponte and Mozart chose three distinct voice registers for the three: dramatic soprano for Anna, lyric soprano for Elvira and soprano leggero or mezzo for the peasant girl Zerlina. The Ewig Weibliche or Eternal Feminine may not be confined to one type of woman; three distinct aspects of femininity are used to describe the ideal woman that Don Giovanni perpetually seeks.
Another theme is the class difference between the women: Anna is an aristocrat, Elvira a bourgeois, and Zerlina, a peasant or a plebeian. Alas, Bernard rendered the whole affair utterly middle class. The opening scene at Anna’s home was a bland party where an unmasked Giovanni was a guest. Judging from the outfits of Anna, her father and fiancé, they are of an equal or lower social class than the « peasants » Zerlina and Masetto. In such a case, the famous duet « Là ci darem la mano » between Giovanni and Zerlina falls totally flat. In Da Ponte’s text, Giovanni uses his status and the false promise of marrying Zerlina as a tool of seduction. With Zerlina of a similar or superior social station, Giovanni’s words « Tal parola non vale un zero. Voi non siete fatta per esser paesana, un’altra sorte vi procuran quegli occhi bricconcelli...” and « Quel casinetto è mio: soli saremo, e là, gioiello mio, ci sposeremo » made little or no sense.
A third theme is Don Giovanni’s sexual taste. Bernard seems to make him an aficionado of sadomasochism and bondage. When he attempts to rape Zerlina in Act I, he ensnares her with handcuffs. However, Da Ponte’s seducer, who has a vast appetite as described in the catalogue aria, “contadine, cameriere, cittadine... contesse, baronesse, marchesine, principesse”, “la bionda”, “la bruna”, “la grassotta”, “la magrotta”, “la grande maestosa”, “la vecchia”, “la piccina” and finally the Don’s favourite “la giovin principiante”. He even seduces elderly women “pel piacer di porle in lista” or for the mere pleasure of adding them to his list. Such a serial seducer is an omnivore, not merely someone hooked on a particular kink. However, in Bernard’s overly middle class universe, where all characters are of the same dull background, bondage has an appealing shock value. Pity, as the real Don Giovanni is anything but bland or middle class.
Had Giovanni been a serial killer, the cover of matrimony may have been a valid one. However, the psychological profile of Da Ponte’s Don Giovanni contradicts the need for a cover or the compromise of matrimony. Bernard’s Giovanni would have happily conceded to the Commendatore’s offer to repent, “Pentiti, cangia vita, è l’ultimo momento!”. A middle class sex addict and cheating husband is certainly not worthy of an opera. Alas, nor was Bernard’s hopeless staging worthy of Mozart’s operatic masterpiece.
Ossama el Naggar
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