Not so slight & surprisingly experimental: the Royal Opera & La Nuova Music bring a touch of 1930s glamour to Handel's ugly duckling opera, Giustino

Handel: Giustino - Esme Bronwen-Smith, Polly Leech, Kelly Fuge, Mireille Asselin, Benjamin Hulett (with bag over his head) - La Nuova Musica at Royal Opera House (Photo: Marc Brenner)

Handel: Giustino; Polly Leech, Mireille Asselin, Keri Fuge, Esme Bronwen Smith, Jake Arditti, Benjamin Hulett, Jonathan Lemalu, director: Joe Hill-Gibbins, La Nuova Musica, conductor: David Bates; Linbury Theatre at the Royal Opera House
Reviewed 15 October 2025

The Royal Opera returns to late Handel with a production of his problematic Giustino that brings out the musical riches along with a surprising emotional depth, along with a touch of glamour

Handel's late operas have generally been regarded as problematic, with their recitative and plot cut to the bone. The Royal Opera's production of Arminio (from 1737) proved that in the right hands these fascinating if flawed pieces can work on the modern stage [see my review]. Now, in collaboration with La Nuova Musica, the Royal Opera has returned to 1737 with a production of Handel's Giustino.

The libretto was originally written for a 1683 opera by Legrenzi which received a spectacular production in Venice featuring an elephant, elaborate naval and land battles and a welter of smaller roles. By the time the libretto reached Vivaldi in 1724 the characters had been reduced to nine. This was the source of Handel's libretto, though Handel's unknown literary collaborator made radical changes.

1175 lines of recitative are reduced to just 350 and the character of Andronico is removed (Winton Dean speculates that Handel may simply not have had a singer for it). He is a third brother (to Giustino and Vitaliano) and spends a lot of the early part of the opera courting Leocasta. Not only are aspects of the plot positively telegraphic - Arianna goes to join Anastasio's army but after three lines of recitative and a short aria he has lost a battle, Arianna has been captured and Giustino needs to go to the rescue. But without Andronico, Leocasta is left with nothing to do for large stretches of the opera.

Handel: Giustino - Polly Leech, Mireille Asselin (as La Fortuna) - La Nuova Musica at Royal Opera House (Photo: Marc Brenner)

Not surprisingly, the opera has not had that many outings. It was presented by Alan Kitching in the UK in 1960s, and there is a recording from Göttingen in 1995 based on a production that Winton Dean describes as grossly distorting the opera. The London Handel Society presented it at Sadler's Wells in the early 1980s. If memory serves me right, James Bowman sang the title role and it was a remarkably imaginative production.

We caught Covent Garden's production at the Linbury Theatre on 15 October. Handel's Giustino was directed by Joe Hill-Gibbins with designs by Rosanna Vize. David Bates conducted La Nuova Musica with Polly Leech as Giustino, Keri Fuge as Anastasio, Mireille Asselin as Arianna, Esme Bronwen Smith as Leocasta, Jake Arditti as Amanzio, Benjamin Hulett as Vitaliano and Jonathan Lemalu as Polidarte.

For all the work's faults, there is much of interest. This was a period when Handel seemed to feel at liberty to experiment. Not only was he measuring himself against the younger style of opera with shorter, more tuneful arias, but he was experimenting with the form itself. In Giustino there are far fewer big da capo arias and the work includes a remarkable number of cavatinas, along with choruses, accompaganatos and sinfonias. Orlando apart, it is one of Handel's most flexible operas. A prime example is Giustino's first entry, which rather than being the conventional aria is a series of linked lyric sections. Yes, he does fall asleep (this happens twice to the character) but total result of the scene is to seem far more modern.

The challenges for any director are not just the telegraphic of the plot. There are eight characters (rather more than many Handel operas) with two different villains plus a henchman. And a significant amount of actual plot. Not to mention an appearance of the goddess La Fortuna, an attack by a bear and a ravening sea monster!

Handel: Giustino - Jonathan Lemalu, Keri Fuge - La Nuova Musica at Royal Opera House (Photo: Marc Brenner)

Joe Hill-Gibbins and designer Rosanna Vize gave us a yellow-orange ochre space initially populated by characters redolent of Hollywood in the 1930s. Mireille Asselin's Arianna was the epitome of 1930s glamour and Keri Fuge's Anastasio echoed the style. Benjamin Hulett's Vitaliano was clearly a gangster with Jonathan Lemalu following. This helped to give us a coherent background. Hill-Gibbins also remedied the plot gaps by having the characters on stage for a lot of the time, interacting even when not singing. This helped develop coherent relationships which could be exploited when the music allowed. Asselin and Fuge as Arianna and Anastasio were not quite as loved up at the opening as the music suggested, thus setting the scene for Anastasio's later jealousy. The long fallow stretches for Esme Bronwen Smith's Leocasta were used to suggest her burgeoning relationship with Polly Leech's Giustino.

Another innovation was to link the three extra appearances to existing characters. La Fortuna was played by Mireille Asselin in another glamorous costume. Jake Arditti's Amanzio was the bear and Benjamin Hulett's Vitaliano was part of the sea monster. Thus giving these episodes rather more psychological depth.

It all worked because Hill-Gibbins and his cast took the piece entirely seriously, there was never a hint of the sort of comedy or irony which can be fatal to this type of enterprise. In the pit David Bates and his ensemble did a similar job, giving us prime Handel performance. And Hill-Gibbins had one more trick up his sleeve. Handel's scoring uses a surprising amount of trumpet and horn and these players were on stage, adding to the vividness of the sound.

In the title role, Polly Leech was an engagingly Harry Potter-ish hero, thinking he is ordinary and discovering he is not. In this version, Giustino was also discovering love and relationships - first his attraction to Esme Bronwen Smith's Leocasta, then the suggestion at the end of Part One that Giustino, Anastasio and Arianna went off for a three-some during the interval, and all the complexities of Anastasio's jealousy of Giustino, fuelled by Jake Arditti's vicious Amanzio in Part Two. Leech was fully equal to everything the role threw at her, making emotional material of Handel's more experimental sections and having the Handelian chops for her big aria.

Handel: Giustino - Esme Bronwen-Smith, Mireille Asselin- La Nuova Musica at Royal Opera House (Photo: Marc Brenner)

Mireille Asselin worked Arianna's glamour to the ultimate and created a strongly etched character. She was helped by the fact that Arianna has some of the strongest music in the opera. Asselin's Arianna was suitably complex, all coiled sexuality and danger. The staging made a virtue of the fact that there was no battle scene, it was clear that this Arianna was not going to war with weapons, reminding you somewhat of ENO's production of Partenope (which returns this autumn) where war is replaced by something else entirely.

Did this Arianna love Keri Fuge's Anastasio? Certainly their love-duet (not prime Handel), was cool-ish and Asselin made the complexities of the three sided relationship with Leech's Giustino into an emotionally charged thing. It was hardly Fuge's fault that Anastasio is not a fully developed character. There is a dichotomy here. He is the ruler, he is Giustino's commanding officer but he is not the hero of the opera. Handel could not allow him to outshine Giustino. Fuge made the character a bit vacillating but nonetheless sympathetic and from her performances you wished she had had more to sink her teeth into.

Esme Bronwen Smith's best moment was her opening aria. This is a stunning piece of musical theatre which Bronwen Smith did magnificently. Unfortunately, after being rescued by our hero, she is left hanging. But Bronwen Smith gave a typically thoughtful performance throughout and when she was finally united with Leech's Giustino there was satisfaction all round.

Benjamin Hulett really only got to show his dramatic chops in the first half of the opera, in the second half he spent a lot of time in jail. But Hulett impressed, he has the power and the athleticism for this type of role. It was originally written for the young John Beard and it shows. Hulett was fully engaged in his arias, convincing in his blustering love for Arianna, and it made me thing that he would make a fine Bajazet in Tamerlano. As his sidekick, Jonathan Lemalu had an aria that is technically redundant, but Lemalu never once made us feel that.

As Amanzio, Jake Arditti had to go from zero to sixty in an alarmingly short time. Having been a bit character in the first half, he was suddenly revealed as a scheming villain. The writing makes more sense when you realise that it is really a bass role. Arditti had the time of his life and made this work in spades. There was never anything trustworthy about this man, and Arditti's vocalism was completely matched to the character.

We had a chorus of eight who were on-stage for much of the time, their roles fluid. They made a coherent part of the drama and the choral contributions added to the vivid impression of the music.

It helped that David Bates and La Nuova Musica were on thrilling form. Much of the playing was vivid, often highly articulated and strongly up front, yet in the more pastoral elements there was great lyrical beauty. Bates brought out the imagination and the sheer variety of the score. No it is not perfect, but it is not as slight as some commentators suggested. The instrumental playing was superb, not just the on-stage trumpets and horns (Paul Sharp, Matthew Wells, Ursula Paludan Monberg, Joseph Walters), but oboists Leo Duarte and Sarah Humphrys doubling on recorder at key moments.

Handel: Giustino - Esme Bronwen-Smith, Polly Leech - La Nuova Musica at Royal Opera House (Photo: Marc Brenner)

As far as I can see Joe Hill-Gibbins operatic experience has been restricted to Mozart, 20th century and contemporary opera. Stepping into the rather different world of Baroque opera seria he seemed very at home and this production managed to bring remarkable emotional depth to a problematic piece, helped by superb performances from cast and orchestra.

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