It takes a lot to upstage Anna Netrebko in full flight, but director Davide Livermore comes pretty close to it in this constantly shifting, shape-changing production.
The huge walls of Sant’ Andrea slide into each other, the chapel rotates, tombs and statues come and go. It’s a bit like watching a show at a theatre with the removal men at work.
Meanwhile, a wave of Cavaradossi’s brush turns the monochrome Attavanti sketch into a glorious oil painting in bright colours (sadly then pixilated in the video recording). With changing video projections and the angle sometimes shot from a camera soaring aloft, the effect can be disorientating.
The setting is one to inspire awe, and it is in the power of the church as much as in the power of the state that the evil Scarpia clothes himself, emerging through a golden haze that crowns him with a halo, and able to ignite a galaxy of candles with a flick of his fingers.
The baron’s apartments in the Farnese Palace, serviced by nuns, could almost be an extension of the basilica, with living statues in the relief panels, figures that come to life in Tosca’s great aria, "Vissi d’arte".
Such distractions perhaps force Netrebko to even greater heights of artistry. The voice is sumptuous—it reminds me of a bass clarinet in its depth—and there is no difference in the tonal quality at any volume, right up to the powerful top, sustained long and evenly at every climax.
Her Tosca is more the grande dame than the ingenue perhaps—not a woman accustomed to opening her own doors—but she is transformed magnificently by the murder of Scarpia, frozen to the spot, clumsy and dizzy with horror. Conductor Riccardo Chailly, whose strings sound opulent throughout, holds the moment. The effect is electrifying.
The lyrical tenor of Francesco Meli as Cavaradossi blends wonderfully in perfect union with Netrebko, particularly in their first act love duet, and Luca Salsi is a lowering, menacing Scarpia, without quite the sly insinuation that some bring to the role.
Alfonso Antoniozzi is an amusingly ill-tempered Sacristan and Carlo Bosi the cold-hearted Spoletta, intoning the Dies Irae in yet another directorial touch after Cavaradossi’s torture chamber is raised to the stage from immediately below Scarpia’s rooms.
Gio Forma’s extravagant set designs are complemented by Gianluca Falaschi’s costumes, which have Tosca first appear in a blazing red cape, then in a blue gown stained as if she had been wading knee-deep in Scarpia’s blood.
As a finale, Tosca does not fall from the battlements, but her double floats above them into the heavens. It’s not the effect intended, but it is as if Netrebko is seen to rise above all the over-elaborate stagecraft after all.