New York Classical Review

The Metropolitan Opera’s Coney Island Così fan tutte returned to the house Wednesday after an absence of six years. First seen at the Met in 2018, it returned in 2020, only to have that revival cut short by the Covid pandemic.

Phelim McDermott’s staging is set in the legendary 1950s seaside amusement park in Brooklyn. The director claims that the heightened, slightly unreal atmosphere makes the opera’s improbable disguises and rapid romantic reversals more believable. The implication is that Mozart’s comedy needs a little help from the director.

Although the concept has its fleeting charms, the production remains simply too busy and distracting right from the curtain. Mozart’s Overture begins and ends solemnly, but in between is a delightful, crisp, witty romp. Much of its charm was drowned out by laughter as Gerald Finley’s Don Alfonso drew a parade of sideshow performers from a large crate at center stage, ranging from sword swallowers to a bearded woman and snake charmers.

The locale lends itself to some striking visuals courtesy of set designer Tom Pye. The Playboy Club, complete with rabbit-eared Bunnies serving cocktails, is an uneasy fit with what follows. But it immediately establishes Don Alfonso as a sophisticated rake, with a particularly jaundiced view of women. That milieu sets up his wager with Ferrando and Guglielmo that their fiancées, Fiordiligi and Dorabella, will be unfaithful if given the opportunity.

Among the production’s visual delights are Coney Island’s famous Cyclone, delicately traced in lights, and the carnival rides. Ferrando and Guglielmo try to lure the sisters onto the spinning teacups enveloped in mist, their crisp naval uniforms exchanged for 1950s greaser garb. An erotic charge animates the two couples’ ride on the merry-go-round after they exchange partners. Perhaps the loveliest image is Fiordiligi singing “Per pietà, ben mio, perdona” from a hot-air balloon, suspended above the action as she struggles with her growing feelings for Ferrando and her guilt over betraying Guglielmo. Much of this unfolds against stunning sunsets.

The Met fields a strong cast for this revival, although Federica Lombardi’s Fiordiligi and Samantha Hankey’s Dorabella surpass Duke Kim’s Ferrando and Andrey Zhilikhovsky’s Guglielmo in vocal allure and dramatic punch. Laura Hopkins’s costumes give the women an elegant, stylized version of the 1950s bobby-soxer look, elevating the production’s visual sensibility. Not that Lombardi needs any help in either department.

Lombardi’s Fiordiligi is a class act, from her remarkable poise to the spinning legato that underpins her luscious lyric soprano. “Come scoglio” emerged naturally from the musical textures and dramatic circumstances, more a testament to love than the emotional outburst it can often be. Lighter than air aptly describes both Lombardi’s singing and the sight of her floating above the stage in the fantastical balloon.

Samantha Hankey’s Dorabella is far feistier, eager to indulge in an innocent fling while the guys are away. Her voice has a natural excitement that carries easily through the house. Hankey can spin a melody as beautifully as Lombardi, but she really excelled in “Smanie implacabili,” reveling in its melodrama.

A crisp naval uniform suited Kim more than the James Dean-inspired garb. Kim sang an emotionally rich and vocally lovely “Un’aura amorosa,” but it took a while for his Ferrando to catch fire. When it did, he seized the spotlight. His charged “Ah! lo veggio quell’anima bella” was one of the evening’s highlights.

As Guglielmo, Zhilikhovsky channeled the cocky, wisecracking greaser of 1950s rock-and-roll movies. More than the other three leads, he leaned into the freewheeling, fun-filled hijinks. His singing had the same swagger and ease until it erupted in Guglielmo’s litany of women’s perfidies in Act II.

Ana María Martínez’s worldly, wisecracking Despina was as tart as her crisp maid’s uniform. It’s a luxury to have the role cast with a soprano as rich and well-rounded as Martínez’s, which made her arias all the more attention-grabbing. She shed her drollness for her delightful doctor and notary, delivered in a piercing nasal twang.

Finley’s Don Alfonso was a sophisticated cynic content to mastermind the action, rather than milk the role for laughs. His resonant bass-baritone anchored the production, especially in the beautiful Act I trio (“Soave sia il vento”) with Lombardi and Hankey. In the final scene, Finley explodes on stage in a dazzling red-sequined suit and indulges in a romantic plot twist Mozart didn’t imagine.

Conductor Nimrod David Pfeffer came up through the Met’s ranks, first as a fellow in the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program and later as a longtime member of the music staff. His reading was light, airy, and graceful—at times at odds with the antics onstage but mostly rewarding.

Così fan tutte runs through October 23. metopera.org