Analysing why the Met Tosca didn't work

"Mattila plays the prima donna Floria Tosca as an over-the-top old-school diva, all self dramatizing
nervous energy. This is dangerous, as the events of the last day of Tosca’s life would excite a buried Samuel Beckett heroine from torpor into frenetic activity: Tosca endures jealous frenzies, first soothed and then confirmed, a command performance before the queen, the torture of her lover, then betraying him, a brutal seduction, a hot-blooded murder, her lover’s apparent salvation, his actual death, and a desperate leap to her own."

"If none of this penetrates her self-involvement, perhaps the business with Scarpia isn’t really so bad — she just gets carried away. You know: divas!"

Read the whole review HERE in Opera Today. Jon Yohalem doesn't simply squawk mindlessly at the notorious production, but analyzes why it doesn't work. This is what reviewing should be. Opinion per se isn't enough, it's how opinion is arrived at. Read it whatever you think about the Met or the hoohah around it. The film is screening tonight in UK but I couldn't get in - completely sold out. On the other hand maybe I lucked out for a change.