Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny at the Olympia Theatre, June 17th 2014.

Rough Magic Theatre Company and Opera Theatre Company’s joint production of Weil and Brecht’s The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny has been billed as the opera event of the year as a result of receiving a large grant from the Sky Arts Ignition programme. The extra clout from this association with Sky meant that this opera was heavily advertised on YouTube, which must surely be a first for an Irish opera production. Sadly, as always, the YouTube ads were extremely irritating.

An important element of this production is the attempt to move away from the traditional manner of presenting opera by cutting up the stage, putting seats on it and then spreading the action around the theatre (although most things still happen on stage). The orchestra sits where one side of the stalls would normally be, facing towards the stage. This arrangement works very well for audience members sitting on the stage, who are within a few feet of the singers and can hear and see everything. On the other hand, people sitting at the back of the stalls are unable to see anything that’s happening on the balconies (directly above their heads) and are directly beside the timpani and brass instruments. It is difficult to believe that these people are able to hear any singing over the orchestra, let alone make out the words (there are no surtitles to help out), and there is surely danger of damage to their hearing. The sale of these seats is morally questionable (it must be torture to sit there with a trumpet in your ear for two hours) and the fact that this supposedly innovative approach to theatre layout would create such inequality should have been noticed and improved at the planning stage.

The costume design is excellent and great attention has been paid to small details in the props. The singing is mostly to a very high standard. Claudia Boyle revels in the role of Jenny Smith, her singing is stunning and stylish and her acting extremely sexy. John Molloy is a hilarious highlight as Trinity Moses, and by far the most convincing actor of the male singers: a totally believable hardman. The female chorus have some magical moments, beautifully balanced and tuned in their high, soft passages. The orchestra, a scratch band of mainly freelance players, is terrific and energetic.

There are a couple of cheesy moments, in particular a couple of very dodgy Dublin accents from male singers, as well as the bizarre opening: someone shouts at conductor David Brophy, runs at him with a newspaper and throws it at him; he makes some kind of aggressive flourish with it and then drops it and brings the orchestra in. It’s not exactly clear what the intention is here, but the effect is mystifying and cringe-worthy.

Mahagonny’s claim to be the opera event of the year is seriously undermined by the fact that the music is just not that interesting. Weil’s score is always pleasant but it is rarely either electrifying or stunning. Large sections of the opera are quite boring. Perhaps more importantly, it lacks the quality of pacing that great opera needs. There is no sense of gradually rising musical tension as the opera progresses – just a steady stream of pleasant music – and no cathartic climax. An obvious contender for the title ‘opera event of the year’, if a winner must be chosen, is Wide Open Opera’s Nixon in China, and with other recent operas such as The Importance of Being Earnest and The Alma Fetish still fresh in the memory Mahagonny falls far short.