The House Manager announces cast changes due to illness. Hedwig Ritter (Eurydice) couldn’t sing, and Timothy Fallon’s Pluto would be sung by Victoria Rottensteiner, but off-stage. In fact, she had sung the part in Berlin, and in French! In the event, Victoria’s marvelous soprano- from the rear of the orchestra- was a highlight. ‘We will fail gloriously,’ bravely ad-libbed the ‘compere’. Well, they failed. But producers’ Spymonkey (Toby Park and Aitor Basauri) motto is ‘No risk, no fun!’

It opens with the appearance of Jacques Offenbach (Marcel Mohab), in top hat and white fur coat. As the ‘founder of operetta’, he’s returned to Vienna, time-travelled, to see his greatest hit (Orpheus.) He jokes with the audience, reappears as link man, but the repeated joke about his being at Volksoper, which he’s mistaken for Staatsoper (Vienna State Opera), wears a bit thin. And Offenbach would never have approved of this vulgar, bawdlerised production. As Volksoper’s previous long-running (2007) production shows, Offenbach’s best operettas are masterpieces, musically, and in Crémieux/Halévy’s libretto, brilliantly witty, social and political satires, in no need of cheap slapstick for laughs.

The figure of ‘Public Opinion’ (Ruth Brauer-Krem) arrives in a gold cape. Then audience anticipation is deflated by the Overture, Alexander Joel’s Volksoper Orchestra not at their peak, played to a faux-velvet red curtain and empty stage.

Offenbach’s lampooning of pompous French (Second Empire) society made him the butt of cartoons. Yet he would not have condoned the crude jokes in Act 2. Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld is a brilliant send-up of the classic narrative. In Scene 1, ‘the Death of Eurydice’, in Offenbach’s scurrilous take, Eurydice (Hedwig Ritter) is having an affair with shepherd Aristeus. So Orpheus takes his revenge…
But this is like a pantomine with ‘humanised’ sheep cavorting in a ballet. They strip-off behind the (cardboard) cut-out bushes. Oh, yeah, revealing they’re shapely human. Then these man-size bees in striped, fluffy tops- the classical cut-out temple behind – emerge from the reeds. Orpheus has put a poisonous snake in the love nest. ‘Death will come to me as a friend’, she laments. ‘Come to me’. But it’s Pluto, her shepherd-disguised lover, who leads her down to the underworld. And Pluto is sung by a woman (Rottensteiner), now in a red cloak and wielding a devil’s fork, but not at all fierce.

The set (Scene 2) for Olympus is an improvement, the background (Julian Crouch), white cloud effects, blue skies, and ‘Olympian’ classical facades of palaces (cut-outs.) Public Opinion is in white -they’re all in white- their heads wreathed. And Jupiter (Marco di Sapia) wears a white top hat and cloak.
Venus (Katia Ledoux) arrives. She can’t stop laughing. ‘Why has she come; everybody’s asleep! Cupid, the petite Juliette Khalil), suspended in a harness, swings over, her brilliant, high-pitched soprano a highlight. She appears to be darker-skinned- is she blacked-up- and has some of the best vocal lines. But with the appearance of Saturn (Timothy Fallon) it descends into farce, and there are longeurs in their dance number. The video effects (Joshua Higginson) of the pastoral landcape, back of stage, are effective.
Orpheus, (a portly Daniel Kluge) arrives on roller skates. Pluto is summoned for suspected kidnapping, but devilishly tempts the gods with his cooking: they’re bored with nectar and ambrosia. So they’re incited to revolt with placards, Schluss mit Nectar. Jupiter is the target. He’s now accused of being a notorious womaniser, leading an excessive lifestyle. And they’re all making fun of him. ‘Public opinion’ placates Olympus, bringing Orpheus who has to pretend concern over his wife. Jupiter assures Orpheus he’ll visit the Underworld – allured by Eurydice’s famed beauty- a cue for all Olympus to visit.

Act 2, in the Underworld, Eurydice has a ravishing soprano, but she’s miming. The voice comes from the back of the Orchestral pit, and its power fills the house. And it’s in French! Rottensteiner, in black deejay, sings off-stage, but Ritter’s Eurydice, on stage, continues in German recitative. There’s farce for you! Mohab’s Offenbach is still cracking the joke, enraged at being at Volksoper, not Staatsoper.
Down under, Eurydice’s bored in a boudoir in hell, and not with the lover she bargained for. Pluto descends back into the underworld, now with Jupiter. Marco di Sapio’s Jupiter is dreadfully overplayed, ultimately boring. And that accent! Again, Pluto as a woman, both absurd and miscast, though charming. There’s a set piece about three judges, before which Pluto and Jupiter have to appear, Pluto to prove his innocence. An enormous dog – a hound from hell – is shot, and poos on stage, leaving a disgusting real-looking turd.
PINK POLICE (Cupid’s squadron) get in line with their whistles. To Offenbach’s Can-Can refrain -out of tune- but it’s like a Stan Stennett silent movie sketch. Actually funny. They somehow avoid the turd pool.
A ‘giant fly’ is conjured up, one of Jupiter’s incarnations to woo his latest love victims. A group of dancers under red light coordinate with Pluto’s pink police. Juno, Jupiter’s wife, Johanna Arrous’s outstanding mezzo, interrupts Eurydice, (albeit miming in French). Arrouas was one of the evening’s higlights.
The fly (Jupiter disguised) puts his ‘hand’ in the shit, as if to eat it; puts his nozzle to it; then picks it up. Attention! This is it: as low as you can go. Then exposed by Juno- it’s Jupiter, after all. Mighty King of Heaven, Da bin ich! Finally, the big poo is cleared away by uniformed park-keepers into a black poop bag.
Back to operetta (!) in the Finale, Cupid descends for the bacchanal. Volksoper Chorus are inspiring. Eurydice performs a dance, to the gods’ applause. They demand, Father Jupiter, dance for us! What thin legs Di Sapia has got! And to top it all, a club with a bar is raised up from the stage. And there’s a Can-Can dance routine, front-stage, dancers (Vienna State Ballet) in red frocks and tights. But they’re not all girls in the line up. Very professional, but all too brief. We needed more of this!

Offenbach (Mohab) makes a final appearance: the joke about Volksoper not being Staatsoper yet again. The boat across the Styx ferries Orpheus and Eurydice, re-united once again: but Eurydice, don’t turn round! (Or forever condemned.) I couldn’t wait to get off.
A travesty, crass as it was, it ended to great applause from a packed house. In fairness, I was reluctant to write this review, given the confusing last-minute cast changes. But Offenbach, a great comic-opera composer, mis-understood, still underrated, deserves better than this. I thought I’d warn you. Please, Volksoper, bring back the previous. © PR. 21.3.2023
Photos: Ruth Brauer-Kvam (Public Opinion, Vienna State Ballet dancers; Johanna Arrouas (Juno), Marco Di Sapia (Jupiter); Hedwig Ritter (Eurydice), Marco Di Sapia; Vienna State Ballet(Can-Can); Featured Image: Timmothy Fallon, Marco Di Sapia, Jacob Semotan, Hedwig Ritter
© Barbara Pálffy/ Volksoper Wien