Operatic love stories, by and large, deal with the consuming passions of the young. Given by English Touring Opera as The Wild Man of the West Indies, Donizetti’s Il Furioso all’Isola di San Domingo, however, examines desire as affected by age, experience and time.
Cardenio and Eleonora, whose marriage previously foundered on her adultery, are brought back together, years later, by chance. Her betrayal has driven him half-mad, and when the work opens, we find him living in self-imposed exile on the Caribbean island of San Domingo. Eleonora is consumed with remorse at having destroyed him. Donizetti charts their progress towards eventual reconciliation in music of exquisite poignancy.
The opera has been described as Shakespearean, and there are overtones of The Tempest in the metaphysical storm that wrecks Eleonora’s ship on Cardenio’s island. Yet there are also ambivalences in narrative and tone at the work’s centre. Donizetti never fully establishes whether Cardenio’s brother Fernando, who survives the same shipwreck, is also Eleonora’s former lover. And his San Domingo is no enchanted island, but a Spanish colonial outpost, where plantation manager Bartolomeo sympathises with Cardenio’s plight, but terrorises his slave Kaidamà. Iqbal Khan’s staging probes the work’s personal and political concerns, and forcefully underscores the point that private reconciliation and social justice rarely go hand in hand.
Conducted by Jeremy Silver, it’s performed with terrific commitment. Sally Silver’s Eleonora and Craig Smith’s Lear-like Cardenio really convince you of the couple’s pain. Nicholas Sharratt’s Fernando is superbly uppity and elegant, while Peter Braithwaite’s Kaidamà has the wit and bravado of the born survivor. A brave revival of a complex, sometimes tricky piece, and highly recommended.
• At the Hall for Cornwall, Truro (01872-262466) on 17 March, then touring.
