Robert Thicknesse on Opera

The Don undone

THE OLD DUDE’S BEEN losing his mojo for a while now. The swordsman of Seville can’t really be bothered to haul it out of the scabbard these days. And those trusty lines, the repartee, the badinage and persiflage: even the chocolate-factory ladies of York are beginning to find it a bit ripe. He’s even tried going gay, but a paltry mille e tre just seemed, well, a bitgay. Now you’ll just find him, arthritic, unshaven, eyes like bloody oysters, in the corner of some old pub, sucking on roll-ups and dribbling into his half, swapping wheezy yarns with the equally remaindered Harry Flashman about those nuns in Naples and the stint as tennis coach at St Mary’s. Poor old Don Giovanni. Perhaps Mozart had an inkling this was going to…

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The Critic (Digital) - 1 Issue, July 2023

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