Mozart La Clemenza di Tito Royal Danish Opera, April 2004 / English National Opera, February 2005 Director David McVicar Lighting Paule Constable

The production was nominated for an Olivier Award for Best New Opera Production.

Reviews

The tone adopted by McVicar and his designers, Yannis Thavoris and Paule Constable, is both sophisticated and simple. A set of convex walls and grilles creates a constantly evolving world of visual perspectives, shrouded in wisps of dry ice and elegant decoration - much of it bearing an Indian/ near-eastern flavour. ... Despite its aesthetic tone, this framework is anything but artificial. It allows us to focus on what Mozart's music and Amanda Holden's translation are telling us. (Financial Times)

Through a revolving broken circle of concave concrete panels and a lattice screen, Yannis Thavoris's sets austerely suggest imperial Rome, with overtones of Edo Japan and modernist brutalism. (Telegraph)

Yannis Thavoris’s set, a lattice grill, a screen of embroidery, and curved walls that move around the stage, throws the action into sharp and isolating focus. (Sunday Telegraph)

McVicar and his designer, Yannis Thavoris, make much of the opera's magnificent austerity. The wilful mix of styles and cultures reflects the long history of autocratic rule and gives the drama a reach far beyond ancient Rome. ... Visually, this is a seductive show. The stage pictures evolve through a series of curved, sliding screens - one adorned in exquisite detail from Japanese silk-embroidery; another of carved lattice-work, like that of a confessional. There is a wonderful sense of the conspiratorial; of desire breeding contempt around every blind corner. Paule Constable's crepuscular lighting heightens the intrigue with ominous shadows. (Independent)

... intelligently designed and lit by Yannis Thavoris and Paule Constable, beautifully sung, compellingly acted, cleverly framed... (Independent on Sunday)

In designs by Yannis Thavoris, the singers are beautifully framed: a group of curved screens, one extravagantly wallpapered, one latticed, casting evocative shadows, are elegantly manoeuvred around the stage on a revolve. The setting is not especially Roman - the costumes look Middle Eastern - but the stage pictures, enhanced by Paule Constable’s superb lighting, are ravishing to behold. (Sunday Times)

McVicar and the designer Yannis Thavoris otherwise concentrate more on the abstractions of power, formal gestures and louring walls ... The overall effect is, strikingly, romantic rather than classical. (ConcertoNet.com)