Until midway through the Komische Oper’s new production of The Nose, few in the audience would have identified ‘tap dancing noses’ as something that had been missing from their life. Yet there they were, tapping away as though it were the most obvious thing in the world. It was a moment of pure inspiration, thrilling not just for its choreography and execution, but for the edge of unfeigned madness it brought to the tale. The audience could hardly contain their enthusiasm, breaking into sustained applause before the last tap had died away. Shostakovich, and even Gogol himself, might not have disapproved.
Although nothing could quite top the dancing nose interlude, Barrie Kosky made sure that the two uninterrupted hours of Shostakovich’s early opera overflowed with similar moments of manic effusion. With few notable exceptions – Kovalyov’s…
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