Metropolitan Opera Archives

Turandot received fourteen performances this season.

Review 1:

Martin Bernheimer of the Los Angeles Times
Pavarotti at Twilight
Luciano Pavarotti venturing the role of Calaf for the first time at the Met, and Jane Eaglen, who also showed some signs of vocal strain

Lots of principals have paraded through the colossal kitsch of Franco Zeffirelli's "Turandot" since the overpopulated chinoiserie-in-excelsis production had its premiere at the Metropolitan Opera nine years ago. But the performance Monday night wasn't like any other. This, after all, was the Luciano and Jane Show.?

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The would-be hero on duty was none less than Luciano Pavarotti, a tenorissimo-in-distress venturing the role of Calaf for the first time here as he approaches his 62nd birthday. The new bigger-than-life heroine was Jane Eaglen, a much-vaunted incipient Isolde trying for a high Nilsson rating in Puccini's Peking.

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The fans came out in superdroves, and many brought along their flash cameras. It was one of those nights at the opera.

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Pavarotti had his moments. When he could legitimately float a softly graceful line, especially at midrange, he did so with melting suavity. He got through his automatically cheered theme song, "Nessun dorma," with muted honor. His diction was exemplary. But Calaf represented a dangerously dramatic challenge for this essentially lyric voice even in his prime. And prime time waits for no man, not even Luciano Pavarotti.

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He must cope these days with numerous physical and vocal infirmities. Apparently unable to maneuver even a couple of stairs without aid, he called upon a supernumerary to strike the great gong for him at the climax of Act One. He surreptitiously sipped water between passionate outbursts and, in general, resembled nothing so much as a singing statue permanently stationed downstage center. Although the position had its acoustical advantages, it hardly masked Pavarotti's nervous mishaps at the outset (memory lapses?), the exposed top tone that came close to cracking, or the pervasive sense of strain.

For the divo, "Turandot" is a career-at-twilight gamble. For Jane Eaglen, the opera must be a career-at-dawn dilemma. The young Briton is moving with alarming speed through perilous operatic waters, singing frequent rings around Wagner, with Normas and Giocondas thrown in on nights off.

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Small wonder that her lush, pliant, extraordinarily vibrant soprano is already showing some signs of unsteadiness and wear. Small wonder that neither she nor the resident divo could sustain much power as they ascended to the any-note-you-can-hold-I-can-hold-longer contests of Act Two.

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Histrionically, Eaglen struck the usual ice-princess poses with as much persuasion as her physique would allow. At least she deserves credit for doing away with the bogeywoman fingernails that have become a creepy comic cliche in this context.

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The Met mustered an all-star supporting cast, with Hei-Kyung Hong as an exquisitely luminous Liu, Roberto Scandiuzzi as a darkly noble Timur and Haijing Fu leading the Ping-Pang-Pong trios with bel-canto opulence. Charles Anthony croaked splendidly as the ancient Emperor.

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James Levine maintained compelling order in the pit, and ardor too, against the odds.

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