Wagner: Der Fliegende Holländer

OPERA
TUESDAY & SATURDAY, MARCH 10 & 14, 2020 (continuing through MARCH 27)
8:00 PM TUESDAY
1:00 PM SATURDAY
[CANCELLED]

Metropolitan Opera
30 Lincoln Center Plaza, Upper West Side, Manhattan

$37-$495
https://www.metopera.org/season/2019-20-season/der-fliegende-hollander/

A fail.  François Girard's production fails to do anything with the trivial and offensively sexist legend being told here, so we just get a very dark, stylized telling of an uninteresting and somewhat repellent tale — not, as in Girard's great Parsifal of last decade, a successful attempt to address the issues raised by a problematic (but unlike here fascinating) libretto.  And the music in this early Wagner piece — from just before he got really good — is ill-served by Valery Gergiev's desultory (at least on opening night) conducting:  overly slow, with no tension but no compensating sweep.  Good performances by the Senta and the Erik.  But, a fail.

MAKE A NIGHT OF IT:  Promenade up Broadway to Le Pif for French food and wine.