Review | Outsider as symbol in under-characterized COC La Reine-garçon

Composer Julien Bilodeau and librettist Michel Marc Bouchard’s La Reine-garçon represents a milestone as the first co-production of a new “mainstage” opera between two of Canada’s major opera companies. Premiered at Opéra de Montréal almost exactly one year ago, it made its Canadian Opera Company debut on Jan. 31st. Taking iconoclast 17th-century monarch Queen Christine of Sweden as its subject, the new work ambitiously grapples with big topics like the emergence of free will, the rationalist philosophy of René Descartes, religious freedom and unconventional sexual desire. With an evocative score and poetic libretto, La Reine-garçon succeeds on many levels, but is let down by some disappointing under-characterization and an overly expository second act.

Bilodeau’s score masterfully evokes Christine’s beloved northern European landscape. As snow falls in the opening forest scene, horns and deep string harmonies signal the frigid temperatures. A brilliant touch of local colour is achieved as we hear a kulning (an ancestral Scandinavian women’s chant) sung hauntingly from offstage by soprano Anne-Marie Beaudette. We get a sense of the allusory nature of Bouchard’s text when Christine is referred to as Artemis, ancient goddess of the hunt upon her first entrance. Although essentially a narrative take on the Queen’s life, Bouchard strikes the right balance between exposition and poetry, especially in act 1.

Kirsten MacKinnon as Christine & Queen Hezumuryango as Ebba Sparre in COC’s La Reine-garçon, Photo: Michael Cooper

Queen Christine’s lesbianism

Although Christina flounted convention in many ways, this version of her story focuses mainly on her unconventional relationship with lady-in-waiting, Countess Ebba. Like most operatic accounts of historic events, La Reine-garçon plays loose with the facts. It’s questionable just how important this relationship was to the Queen. We get several scenes between the two women, including one of the opera’s best, in which Christine suggestively commands Ebba to try on a gown in front of her. Ultimately, Ebba realizes the futility of their relationship and asks Christine to bless her marriage resulting in her expulsion from court.

Focusing on Christine’s purported lesbianism as an important facet of her outsider status unfortunately leaves little opportunity to similarly delve into other anomalous aspects of her character. Her rejection of her native religion, Lutheranism, in favour of Catholicism comes out of nowhere in act 2. Councillor Axel Oxenstierna, a father figure for Christina, leads the chorus in a musically-powerful grand scene reminiscent of a Verdi pezzo concertato. We are perfunctorily informed the Queen has received an invitation from the Pope in Rome to abdicate and assume the status of a Catholic virgin-queen. In terms of characterization, we have been offered little up until this point to explain such a dramatic about-face.

Philippe Sly as Karl Gustav, Kirsten MacKinnon as Christine and Owen McCausland as René Descartes in COC’s La Reine-garçon. Photo: Michael Cooper

Christine as symbolic outsider

This points to the work’s principal shortcoming in failing to make the omnipresent Christine into more than just a symbolic outsider. She is given unbelievable amounts of challenging, high-lying and often stunningly beautiful music to sing, but her character is frustratingly one-note. Two big solos near the end seem almost identical in their musical and narrative intent to demonstrate her love of Sweden and the personal cost of leaving her native land. We miss any soliloquizing around her unconventional upbringing, struggles of faith or trauma over a toxic mother. Too much of the character’s ample stage time is seemingly squandered.

Luckily, the work’s dramaturgical shortcomings are often overcome by the strength of the performances. Soprano Kirsten MacKinnon brings gleaming tone and a purposeful presence to the challenging title role. Her big lyric sound soared over the often heavy orchestration and she probably mined as much nuance as she could from the material. As Ebba, mezzo-soprano Queen Hezumuryango made one of the strongest impressions of the night. Her dark sound possesses a strong, vibrant core which fills the hall and she delivered the text with optimal clarity. Her character only exists, however, as Christina’s object of desire and is given little development of her own.

Isaiah Bell as Count Johan Oxenstierna (far R) with COC Chorus in COC’s La Reine-garçon. Photo: Michael Cooper

Comic suitor

One role that is more fully-fleshed out is Count Johan Oxenstierna. Christine’s opportunistic suitor seeks a political marriage in which he’d be free to look for his carnal thrills elsewhere—cue his longing glance to hunky male chorus member Bradley Christensen. Isaiah Bell’s entrance, in which he extolls the beauty of his own legs, is totally camp and a welcome injection of humour. His reedy, focused tenor completely encompasses the not inconsiderable demands of the role and represents a welcome return to the COC after his impressive Antinous in 2018’s Hadrian by Rufus Wainwright.

Count Carl Gustav, Christina’s cousin, suitor—and in a confusing opening scene her attempted rapist—is another underdeveloped role. After a difficult start in which heavy brass overwhelmed his warm instrument, bass-baritone Philippe Sly did his best to make sense of this character who is himself dumbfounded when Christine makes him heir to her throne. As Axel Oxenstierna, bass-baritone Daniel Okulitch made a belated COC debut and demonstrated why he has been such an internationally-lauded Canadian presence in contemporary opera for going on two decades. His rich, carrying tone projected authority and fatherly concern.

One of the opera’s most successful set pieces is act 2’s cadaver dissection in an observation hall, supervised by René Descartes. Tenor Owen McCausland imbued this gem of a two-scene cameo with appropriately detached bemusement and clarion sound. Veteran bass Alain Coulombe lent his customary rich, cavernous sound to the small role of Descartes’ Assistant.

Aline Kutan as Marie-Éléonore de Brandebourg & Kirsten MacKinnon as Christine in COC’s La Reine-garçon. Photo: Michael Cooper

Toxic mother

Another outstanding scene was a brief, but extremely effective walk-on (hobble-on?) for Christine’s mother, Marie-Éléonore de Brandebourg, who enters supported by two canes, accompanied by a groveling half-man/half beast companion. Coloratura Aline Kutan took every opportunity to convey the woman’s twisted relationship with a daughter she admits to hurling down the stairs after giving birth, disappointed she didn’t have a son. Kutan’s stratospheric cackling is a rare example in this piece where characterization and vocal writing were as one.

Visually, La Reine-garçon offered much in the way of atmospheric sets and costumes. Projections by Alexandre Desjardins added convincing depth, especially the massive gray stone arches framing snowscapes that looked like a homage to Rouiben Mamoulian’s film Queen Christina starring Greta Garbo. Sébastien Dionne’s period costumes were sumptuous and lighting designer Éric Champoux took full advantage of the scrims to create a varied visual palette.

Stage director Angela Konrad positioned the large forces, which included an expanded COC Chorus, to create some memorable tableaux. It is difficult to evaluate her contribution to the effectiveness of the principals’ portrayals given the aforementioned deficiencies in characterization.

Milestone Canadian co-production

The COC Chorus was strong in both its onstage and plentiful offstage contributions. Under COC Music Director Johannes Debus, the COC Orchestra relished the harmonic score’s big sonorities as well as its more tender moments. Despite some misgivings, La Reine-garçon is that rare beast, a new grand opera with a compelling, accessible score that demonstrates the potential for collaboration between Canada’s opera companies. May it inspire more such projects to help build the Canadian opera canon.