Laurent Pelly’s production of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin was recorded for video at La Monnaie – De Munt in 2023.  It’s a severely minimalist production set somewhere, around 1900 or so.  I say somewhere because there’s nothing very Russian about it.  It could be any country gentry and peasants scenario followed by a society ball.  There are no uniforms in sight.  Even Gremin wears ordinary evening clothes, albeit with orders and medals.

The set for the first two acts is a large square platform revolving at centre stage.  It’s about three feet above stage level.  In the opening scene the Larinas and their guests inhabit the platform while the peasantry is at stage level, in semi darkness, and provide the motive power to turn the platform.  Then the platform becomes static with the back half folded up to make a back wall for Tatyana’s bedroom.  Act 2 sees us back with the rotating element but now the guests at Tatyana’s name day party are on both levels, with Lensky wandering disconsolately around at stage level..  During the duel scene, everything is very dark which makes it quite hard to see exactly what’s what.  In Act 3 all this goes and we have a sort of vestigial staircase arrangement with lanterns on which all the action takes place.  It’s still all very dark.

Costuming is strictly civilian and quite simple, especially for the ladies, at least in the first two acts.  There are modest ankle length dresses in pastel colours for the girls and three piece suits with wing collars and ties for the men.  In the last act it’s all properly grand ballroom with tails, evening gowns, jewellery and decorations.

With such a setting everything really depends on the Personenregie (with some help from the choreography).  It’s good; rooted in Pelly’s belief that all the characters are “driven by frustration”.  They act as they do because they believe or intuit that “something” is missing.  The singers convey this convincingly.  Sally Matthews is a very good Tatyana.  She’s properly girlish in the first two acts but seems to transform physically and vocally in Act 3.  Her body language is more mature and she even manages to make her voice sound older.  She’s well matched by Stéphane Degout in the title role.  He oozes stiff arrogance in the first two acts and is really not at all likeable, while singing with style.  He comes close to pulling off a credible transformation in Act 3.  I’m not sure anybody ever makes Onegin’s behaviour in Act 3 entirely credible though!  Lilly Jørstad is quite charming as Olga and there’s some really nice singing from Bogdan Volkov as Lensky.  Nicolas Courjal is both dignified and convincingly passionate as Gremin.

The minor roles are nicely done and the chorus sings very well and the ball scenes seem to be managed by seeding the chorus’ best movers with some real dancers.  The ballroom scenes; town and country, are complex and fun to watch.  The house orchestra sounds fine and Alain Altinoglu conducts effectively enough.

François Roussillon directs for video.  He does rather well.  From the beginning of the duel scene right to the end light levels on stage are uneven and generally dim.  He still manages to show what matters and he takes a fairly expansive view when there’s a lot happening; as in the two dance scenes.  On Blu-ray the picture is just good enough.  I’d be wary of DVD for this one.  Sound; PCM stereo and DTS-MA surround, though is excellent throughout.  There’s a useful interview with Pelly in the booklet which also features a detailed track listing.  Subtitle options are English, German, French, Korean and Japanese.

I suppose in terms of other options the main contender for a fairly traditional Onegin would still be Robert Carsen’s version recorded at the Met in 2007 with Dmitri Hvorostovsky and Renée Fleming.  Though if you live in Toronto you might be getting a bit tired of that production!  The new one stands up pretty well as a solidly acted and sung performance.

Catalogue information: Naxos Blu-ray NBD0185V (release date 14th March)