English Touring Opera’s second show of the autumn tour, Rossini’s Cinderella at the Hackney Empire, felt like seven characters in search of a staging. A handy cast really needed a better showcase for their talents than a rather gestural production, which toured the country alongside The Coronation of Poppea (reviewed online).
When in doubt, opera directors sometimes reach for the old Night at the Museum dodge, and so it was here, for reasons that never became clear; well, perhaps the characters of fairy-tales, all those handsome princes and fairy godmothers, are old hat, and the museum is where they belong. (As does opera itself, arguably, though I’m not sure that’s a particularly useful message to be putting on stage.)
Basia Bińkowska’s stage design, therefore, was precisely that, a room in…
