You won’t hear the 2024 Democratic Party convention chant “We’re Not Going Back” anywhere in the text of Beethoven’s early 19th century opera Fidelio, which has returned to the Lyric Opera of Chicago after a nearly two-decade absence. But that rallying sentiment can be easily applied to the Lyric’s emotional and relevant staging of Fidelio, which has visuals that bring to mind the U.S. human rights scandal of migrant family separations (kids in cages) during the previous presidential administration.
Like the Lyric’s 2005 revival of Fidelio that was relocated from its original setting of an 18th century Spanish prison to a suggestive 20th century Latin American country run by a junta, Beethoven’s only opera has been updated again. This time, director Matthew Ozawa has re-set Fidelio in a modern detention facility.
Ozawa’s new production was originally set to debut at San Francisco Opera in the fall run-up to the 2020 U.S. presidential election. But the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown ended up delaying it until the fall of 2021, when it was safer for masked audiences to attend live performances again.
Now debuting in Chicago, where Ozawa is on the Lyric’s artistic staff, this imported Fidelio mostly succeeds on refashioning this enduring work into a contemporary piece of protest theater. Though many opera purists will be outraged (with some reason), Ozawa’s production strongly continues the long history of Fidelio being both an artistic critique of political injustice and an uplifting paean to the power of love.
Fidelio is a tale of extreme domestic espionage centered around the heroine Leonore (South African soprano Elza van den Heever). Leonore will stop at nothing to rescue her political-prisoner husband, Florestan (American tenor Russell Thomas), and she strategically dons male drag as the jail guard “Fidelio” to infiltrate where he’s being held captive.
As the efficient Fidelio, Leonore has played a long game to gain the trust and respect of the occasionally corrupt prison warden Rocco (Russian bass Dimitry Ivashchenko). But an unforeseen side effect has Leonore as Fidelio also capturing the affections of Rocco’s adult daughter Marzelline (American soprano Sydney Mancasola), and inspired her to reject long-time suitor Jaquino (Cuban-Dominican tenor Daniel Espinal).
Ozawa cleverly builds upon this initial romantic Shakespearean male-drag misdirect as if Fidelio was a satiric TV office sitcom. It’s fun to watch the nepotism hire Marzelline gleefully gossiping with her corporate office co-workers, while also pondering if all those documents they’re filing away in stacks of boxes might end up someday in a bathroom at Mar-a-Lago in Florida.
It’s clear that Beethoven learned the artistic lessons of Mozart’s romantic comedies and German-language singspiels early on in Fidelio, which has introspective character arias and ensembles mixed with dialogue scenes all beautifully sung and acted by the Lyric’s expert cast. But this lovely and leisurely music presages plenty of ugly brutality that comes with the arrival of Florestan’s mortal enemy, Don Pizarro (American baritone Brian Mulligan), who comes off here as a corrupt CEO of for-profit private prisons.
When Don Pizarro gets word that the powerful government minister Don Fernando (American bass-baritone Alfred Walker) will be visiting to investigate abuses at his facility, he starts pressuring Rocco to conspire to secretly execute Florestan and bury him in an underground cistern. Leonore as Fidelio tries to delay this by convincing Rocco’s family to temporarily allow the prisoners to be released from their cells.
It’s here where the condemnation of opera purists will be the loudest against Ozawa’s Fidelio. The text of Beethoven’s iconic prisoner chorus largely has to do with imprisoned men expressing their gratitude of briefly experiencing sunlight and fresh air again.
Ozawa’s production instead shows male and female family members from separate cells searching to temporarily reunite. It’s a very touching moment, but only partially since just the male chorus members sing while the women and children all stay silent.
But I’m more than willing to allow for this textual and dramatic discrepancy as a metaphorical moment of emotional relief—especially with the male voices of Lyric Opera chorus (with strong soloists Travon D. Walker and Christopher Humbert, Jr.) all beautifully expressing the feelings of fathers, sons and brothers who give divine gratitude for these all-too-brief family reunions.
Ozawa’s approach to Fidelio also succeeds visually to comment on contemporary prison industrial complexes with an impressive production design. The only missteps are the creaky stage revolve and the occasional stagehands who can be spied darting in the background.
Set and projection designer Alexander V. Nichols has created a hulking, rotating cube of glass, steel and fencing to show various aspects of the prison’s mountainous bureaucracy and constant, eye-blinding surveillance. Lighting designer Yuki Nakase Link’s strategic use of fluorescent lighting is also emblematic of this, while costume designer Jessica Jahn creates outfits that are both contemporary and generalized enough to hint at any western nation.
The entire principal cast and chorus give impassioned vocal and dramatic performances of heroic and rightfully melodramatic proportions. This is a great credit to both Lyric music director Enrique Mazzola’s fleet leading of Lyric Opera Orchestra, but also to chorus director Michael Black and his fine shaping of the Lyric Opera Chorus.
Elza van den Heever skillfully shows off Leonore’s calculating determination while also sharing her anguish at her husband’s likely doom. As Florestan, Russell Thomas righteously embodies a faith-driven whistle blower who is willing to die for what is right.
Both Sydney Mancasola as the flighty Marzelline and Alfred Walker as the politically glad-handing Don Fernando provide welcome moments of comic relief. Dimitry Ivashchenko as Rocco is also often humorous, though at times I wish he would have leaned more into his character’s dubious moral compass as the right-hand man to Brian Mulligan’s unrepentant and villainous Don Pizarro.
Like most Shakespearean comedies where female characters don male drag to romantically triumph, Fidelio is full of uplift and happiness as it shows the triumph of love over injustice. And the Lyric’s revival unquestionably succeeds with a stockpile of so many contemporary references and resonances.
In this contentious political moment ahead of the presidential election, it’s very clear which side of history Ozawa’s Lyric revival of Fidelio wants to be on. No need to have any “weird” feeling about that, especially when the Lyric’s Fidelio pours forth with so many transcendent melodies and such a thrilling finale wall of vocal sound.
Fidelio plays four more performances at 2 p.m. Sunday and Wednesday, Sept. 29 and Oct. 2, 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 5, and 7 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 10 at the Lyric Opera of Chicago, 20 N. Wacker Dr. Tickets are $42-$355. Sung in German with projected English translations. For information, visit LyricOpera.org or phone 312-827-5600.