It is a production that keeps on giving with Paul Brown’s naturalistic design placing each of the three acts exactly where Puccini intended.
There is no updating from revolutionary Rome of 1800, though a surrealistic touch is added by the dark angel’s wing that overshadows the stage.
No other work by Puccini has such a thriller of a plot, encompassing the three Ps of opera – Passion, Power and Politics.
The first act at the church of Sant’Andrea della Valle ends with the free-thinking artist Cavaradossi compromised for helping a political prisoner to escape, then his lover the diva Floria Tosca unwittingly provides the clue that leads to his arrest.
A masterly touch by lighting designer Mark Henderson has the choir singing the Te Deum in the upper part of the church bathed in heavenly light, while sadistic Police Chief Baron Scarpia in the darkened crypt below anticipates his plan to execute Cavaradossi and possess Tosca.
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The Royal Opera House has slotted in an extended run to March 3, with a changing cast led by three Toscas – Adrianne Pieczonka, Angela Gheorghiu and Martina Serafin.
The orchestra is conducted by Dan Ettinger for five performances and by Placido Domingo for the remaining five.
I caught the first cast with Adrianne Pieczonka as Tosca, Joseph Calleja as Cavaradossi and Gerald Finley as Scarpia.
After the first act, with the diversions of jubilant choir and bustling Sacristan (Jeremy White), we come to the climactic second act in Scarpia’s sombre apartment at the Palazzo Farnese.
The door of his private torture chamber is sited in a wall of empty bookshelves that suggest the sudden removal of the previous inhabitant.
The tension is ratcheted up as Cavaradossi defies the torturers and Tosca bargains with Scarpia for her lover’s life in exchange for her honour.
Calleja is in strong form, extending a ringing top note to the Victory aria as the news of Napoleon’s win reaches Rome.
I am puzzled, though, by Pieczonka’s approach to the title role, one that she has sung already in Toronto, Berlin and Vienna.
The notes are competently sung but the fieriness is lacking.
The famous aria “Vissi d’Arte” (I lived for art, I lived for love) sounded like a recital.
At least Pieczonka put some energy into taking the dinner knife to bass baritone Gerald Finley’s malevolent Scarpia; but the frantic search for the vital pass that would allow the lovers to escape Rome was conducted as if irritated at mislaying her shopping list.
And why has the designer changed Tosca’s dress from white to a dingy grey number resembling cobwebs?
Kent’s staging is comparable in style to David McVicar’s new production of Tosca at the Metropolitan Opera New York, with Sonya Yoncheva as Tosca and Vittorio Grigolo as Cavaradossi.
The Met production was screened worldwide tonight on Cinema Live and may be caught in selected cinemas this week as an Encore, while the Royal Opera’s Tosca will be on Cinema Live on February 7.