‘Otello’s’ growing pains

TWENTY-ONE, we all know, is a difficult age. Los Angeles Opera reached adulthood last fall. It’s ready to make a place for itself in the world: Next season has been planned to be its most ambitious ever. But first there is that father to kill. So Saturday night it unveiled a new production of Verdi’s “Otello” at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion.

The company was born in 1986 with this opera. We ritually tell the tale of opening night. The curtain stuck before rising. A last-minute leading-lady replacement was needed. The company found a Czech soprano, Gabriela Benackova, not terribly well known in America at the time. She was wonderful and suddenly became very well known in America. Placido Domingo, the incomparable Otello of our age, sang thrillingly. The production by the sometimes controversial German director Gotz Friedrich was intelligent and edgy.

This “Otello” returned twice, the last time in 1995, always with Domingo, who now runs the company but no longer sings the role. Friedrich died seven years ago. The time had come for a new “Otello.”

Saturday night the curtain worked just fine. It rose on a storm at sea, and James Conlon, who is still a fresh music director (this is his second season), was, from his first upbeat, at exciting fever pitch. The orchestra sounded splendid. The chorus sang on a world-class level.

For all the company had accomplished by producing its first “Otello” out of nothing, the orchestra and chorus back then could hardly approach the sheer visceral power of this opening chorus, one of the most dramatic in all opera. Swept away by it all, I was ready to believe we had entered a new era. Then I opened my eyes. And, shortly thereafter, my ears.

The new production, which comes by way of Monte Carlo and Parma in Italy, is by John Cox, a veteran British director. Sets and costumes, designed by Johan Engels, felt provincial. A ship is the main motif, and its frame remains through all four acts. Curtains waved to show the winds blowing. A sphere with a flame in it swayed actively and far too long. Materials looked, depending on the light, like either plasterboard or concrete. The awkwardly sloped hull was the evening’s floor. Singers watched their step.

The company cast interestingly. Ian Storey’s American debut is news. Two months ago he sang his first Tristan to open the season at La Scala, in Milan, Italy, and now he is on everyone’s radar. A master carpenter turned major tenor, he has an appealing back story. And everyone, of course, is on the lookout for the next Otello.

Storey may well be a diamond in the rough. He is tall. With livelier direction, better costumes and makeup, and a reasonable floor, he has the potential to appear a more commanding figure. With time his voice may develop the vocal heft, his manner the theatrical weight of a worrier warrior able to work up a murderous anger.

But Saturday he seemed to be still finding his way. He has stamina. He is careful and accurate in his singing. But his tone is pinched, his range of expression limited and, at times, his vibrato wide. He seemed rather good-natured.

Mark Delavan’s Iago showed potential as well. A highly regarded American baritone, a fine singing actor, he was a curious affable villain. If his is not the not black, ominous voice of evil, he certainly has the making for an oily, awful bad guy. But, for all the forceful underpinning of Conlon’s conducting, the baritone seemed to skim the surface of frightful nastiness. Cox used him instead as a kind of frat-boy jerk.

Again, a soprano problem. Coming down with a throat infection during the dress rehearsal, Cristina Gallardo-Domas, a Chilean soprano who was to have made her company debut, was replaced by Elena Evseeva, a regular with the Metropolitan Opera. She flew in from New York on Saturday, met briefly with Conlon and Storey and went on cold.

History did not repeat itself, although, under the circumstances, the Russian soprano was impressive. Oddly, she seemed more natural than most, perhaps because she simply reacted and didn’t have to worry about clumsy direction.

Hers is the classic Russian voice, full-bodied and on the dark side. She is not a frail Desdemona, nor a sensual one. But she could be rapt, and she sang her “Willow Song,” just before Otello kills her, with a beautiful intensity that I found a highlight of the evening.

The smaller roles were all very good. Eric Halfvarson was a forceful Ludovico, the Venetian ambassador. Derek Taylor, a bright, young tenor, was a not-too-bright charismatic Cassio. Ning Liang made a moving Emilia, Desdemona’s maid and Iago’s wife. Gregory Warren’s Roderigo and Ryan McKinny’s Montano were as effective as lackadaisical staging might allow. The fight scenes, though, were pretty phony.

Given the strength of Conlon’s conducting, might not this “Otello” yet wake from its sleepy state during its run? Cox coaxed little from his cast, but he was not on hand Saturday to take a bow. Left to their own devices, singers can still take matters into their own hands (assuming that wasn’t already the case). Or maybe these are just growing pains of a 21-year-old, at once cautious and careless.

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mark.swed@latimes.com

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‘Otello’

Where: Los Angeles Opera at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, 135 N. Grand Ave., L.A.

When: 7:30 p.m. Thursday and Sunday; 1 p.m. Feb. 27; 2 p.m. March 2; 7:30 p.m. March 5; 2 p.m. March 9

Price: $20 to $238

Contact: (213) 972-8001 or www.laopera.com