Madama Butterfly

“And it’s clear that the show’s French-Japanese movement-director Namiko Gahier-Ogawa has put everyone on stage through some rigorous training in the language of Japanese theatrical gesture: we feel this most intensely with the characterisation of Cio-Cio San’s family, with Barnaby Rea’s magnificently forbidding Bonze, and with the characterisation of Cio-Cio San herself. For the way this Butterfly gestures and moves could have come straight out of the floating world of ukiyo-e prints: soprano Anne Sophie Duprels has absorbed that body-language so completely that she can use it to reinforce the expressiveness of her singing.”

“The other big factor was Namiko Gahier-Ogawa’s elaborate movement direction, which decisively placed Butterfly as a young geisha and defined her allure for Pinkerton.”

“Higgins never let it be forgotten that Cio-Cio-San is a dancer. As she circled the stage at her first appearance it was with dancing movements that propelled her and stylised use of her hands and arms that established her as a person.”

“Higgins also reminds us and holds in our mind that Cio-Cio-San is a dancer, Namiko Gahier-Ogawa’s movement working well in context. Nothing peripheral, however, is permitted to obscure the central tragedy: a signal achievement from which many directors could learn.”

“The French soprano Anne Sophie Duprels, fragile but wiry in physique, powerful and communicative in voice, sang the title role. She looked striking in her white bridal kimono and moved gracefully, adorning the minimal designs.”

“This Paul Higgins production succeeds in ways others have foundered because it places trust in very few components.”