Opera North’s The Marriage of Figaro, Theatre Royal, Nottingham | 05 March 2026 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review by William Ruff

Photo credit: Tristram Kenton

Opera North’s The Marriage of Figaro

Theatre Royal, Nottingham | 05 March 2026

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Review by William Ruff

“A Figaro that fizzes with joyful energy.”

Before I start: just a gentle warning to anyone about to see Opera North’s new production of Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro.  Don’t for one second think that the fizzing overture allows you time to get settled into your seat, check your phone is off, see if there’s anyone you know in the next row etc.  You really need to have every sense primed for the four-minute explosion of comic energy that is about to unfold before you.  And if you arrive with any doubts about shifting the action to an English country house in the 21st century, those opening minutes will change your mind.

So what happens?  For a start it opens not with Figaro and Susanna’s marriage but with the Count and Countess’s, complete with bridal bouquet which is deposited in a vase.  Then time passes, marked by flowers and foliage from the different seasons being comically deposited in the same vase.  The overture ends with the new bride as a mother-to-be, a very clever and highly appropriate production idea.  The Countess has married a man for whom marital fidelity isn’t exactly a natural habitat, so her pregnancy makes her plight even more poignant.  These opening few minutes vividly, breathtakingly, achieve so much: the slightly down-at-heel setting of the country house in decline (I was expecting Penelope Keith and a film crew to appear at any moment), the detailed comic acting of everyone you see, the inventive set and the way in which props are joyfully handled - especially the hats and coats hanging on pegs at the back, all ripe for comic business later.

I could go on…but there’s another three hours of opera to go and so far no one has actually sung anything.  All the principals are impressive and manage to combine fine singing with sharply detailed acting.  In fact, this is such an intelligently integrated vision of the opera, all of whose elements move to the rhythms of Mozart’s music and Da Ponte’s libretto.  Examples include the use of doors in Act 2: not grand, palatial 18th century doors but one (very small) one in the eaves, making every entrance and exit a comically tight squeeze – and the other a door to an under-the-stairs cupboard.  When the jealous Count goes for a rummage, he hopes to find proof of his wife’s guilt but emerges with a tiny Babygro: the effect funny and sad at the same time.  In Act 3 a billiard table performs all sorts of dramatic functions and set against a baby’s crib that is being built at the same time.  And it all fits the music like a glove.  In short, three cheers for Director Louisa Miller and Designer Madeleine Boyd.

This production downplays the social differences between Figaro/Susanna and the Count/Countess: not so much masters and servants as employers/employees.  James Newby is a witty, complex and, at the end, thoroughly repentant Count.  Figaro is played by Liam James Karai, every bit his master’s vocal equal, using his physical stature to impressive effect.  Claire Lees makes a brilliant Susanna, the sharpest mind in the house, orchestrating the plot to teach the Count a lesson with clear-eyed ingenuity.  And she sings like an angel too.  As does Gabriella Reyes as the Countess, carrying her pain with a grace that is profoundly moving.  Hongni Wu is astonishingly convincing in the trousers role of Cherubino, the teenage boy who falls in love with all the women he sets eyes on.  Hongni is a delight both to watch and to hear.

This is very much an ensemble production.  Yes, the five principals are impressive but so is everyone else, the host of supporting roles and the large, multi-talented Chorus. All combine musical insight with high-octane acting energy.  In any other production you probably wouldn’t remember Antonio, the gardener who has seen Cherubino escape from an upstairs window - but you do when this Antonio comes in as a beekeeper, smoker in hand, another example of just how this production overflows with ideas.

Oliver Rundell is the conductor – and no matter what bursts from the stage, you never for one second ignore the alert, stylish playing of Opera North’s orchestra or the glories of Mozart’s miraculous score.

Opera North’s The Marriage of Figaro

Directed by Louisa Miller and designed by Madeleine Boyd

Lighting design by Malcolm Rippeth

The Orchestra and Chorus of Opera North conducted by Oliver Rundell

James Newby (Count Almaviva), Gabriella Reyes (Countess Almaviva), Liam James Karai (Figaro), Claire Lees (Susanna), Hongni Wu (Cherubino), Katherine Broderick (Marcellina), Jonathan Lemalu (Bartolo), Daniel Norman (Don Basilio), Charlotte Bowden (Barbarina), Kamil Bień (Don Curzio)

Other tour venues: Lowry Salford Quays, Newcastle Theatre Royal, Hull New Theatre