Cavalli's erotic comedy, the first opera at this candlelit Jacobean theatre, is a first-rate production in a well-nigh perfect venue Francesco Cavalli's L'Ormindo opens with the dedication of a stage.

Thanks to the aeonic timescales involved in opera-house planning, it is not usually possible to revive a hit in a hurry. But at the candlelit Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, where the Royal Opera’s ...

All the seductive candlelit charm of the Wanamaker Playhouse – a scholarly reconstruction of a Jacobean indoor theatre – shouldn’t fool one into thinking that it can convey what early baroque opera ...

The candles are also used imaginatively, with various ‘lighting states’ created by adjusting the height of the six chandeliers, or by cast members carrying lanterns and candelabras to create the ...

Staging an almost forgotten 17th century Italian opera for a 21st century British audience presents a formidable challenge. First you need a theatre that recreates the atmosphere of the period; then ...

What you need to know A new production of Francesco Cavalli's rarely-performed Baroque opera L'Ormindo has opened at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London. The production, directed by Kasper Holten, is ...

Live opera is as physical as art gets, though you would never know that from sitting in any major opera house. By Alexandra Coghlan L’Ormindo Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, London SE1 Shakespeare’s Globe ...

It many ways this Royal Opera/Shakespeare’s Globe co-production is experimental, with everyone involved having to learn from scratch how to work within these limitations, and also what opportunities ...

The star attraction of this production of Cavalli’s L’Ormindo is not the singers or even the conductor, the splendidly resourceful Christian Curnyn: it’s the venue. The Sam Wanamaker Playhouse is the ...

I blame the Venetians. If their 17th-century forebears hadn’t built the first opera houses to allow paid admission, opera would have remained the property of princes and kings. Riff-raff like us would ...