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One minute we are grappling with Rossini's hugely silly L'Occasione fa il Ladro (“Opportunity makes the thief”); the next, the eccentric chef whom we last saw roasting up a pet bird in Gounod's La Colombe (“The Dove”) has swept in with his saucepan for a fleeting cameo.
It's a neat conceit, but it won't make up for the disparity between Rossini's little gem and Gounod's weird amuse bouche - and while Talevi shows a sure hand for the comic frolics of the former, he's no better than his student cast at working out what La Colombe is supposed to be. Is it a Pythonesque farce about a dead parrot, a mad chef and a loopy Countess, or an affectionate portrait of two former lovers looking to rekindle the flame over a plate of poultry?
Difficult to tell from what we saw and, mostly, heard: aided by Madeleine Boyd's chic designs, Talevi painted a pretty picture of a grunge-glam Paris but struggled to keep the momentum - and the jokes - coming. And while Andrew Greenwood teased out lashings of Gallic finesse in the pit, there was little shimmer from the cast.
But L'Occasione was a whole other ball game. It's a razor-sharp rom-com and Talevi kept the action anarchically swift. The humour's as crisp as a glass of dry Pinot Grigio, and it's only Talevi's willingness to allow some choreographed disco-dancing that needs toning down.
The singing, too, was leagues better than the Gounod: only Amar Muchhala's featherweight tenor seemed too slight for Rossini's florid lines. Best in show were the appallingly arrogant but strangely likeable Parmenione (suavely sung by Benedict Nelson), Emily Stevenson's charmingly saucy Ernestina, and - most impressive of all - Lisa Wilson's fiery, passionate and credible Berenice.
It's a neat conceit, but it won't make up for the disparity between Rossini's little gem and Gounod's weird amuse bouche - and while Talevi shows a sure hand for the comic frolics of the former, he's no better than his student cast at working out what La Colombe is supposed to be. Is it a Pythonesque farce about a dead parrot, a mad chef and a loopy Countess, or an affectionate portrait of two former lovers looking to rekindle the flame over a plate of poultry?
Difficult to tell from what we saw and, mostly, heard: aided by Madeleine Boyd's chic designs, Talevi painted a pretty picture of a grunge-glam Paris but struggled to keep the momentum - and the jokes - coming. And while Andrew Greenwood teased out lashings of Gallic finesse in the pit, there was little shimmer from the cast.
But L'Occasione was a whole other ball game. It's a razor-sharp rom-com and Talevi kept the action anarchically swift. The humour's as crisp as a glass of dry Pinot Grigio, and it's only Talevi's willingness to allow some choreographed disco-dancing that needs toning down.
The singing, too, was leagues better than the Gounod: only Amar Muchhala's featherweight tenor seemed too slight for Rossini's florid lines. Best in show were the appallingly arrogant but strangely likeable Parmenione (suavely sung by Benedict Nelson), Emily Stevenson's charmingly saucy Ernestina, and - most impressive of all - Lisa Wilson's fiery, passionate and credible Berenice.
