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Annilese Miskimmon

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Annilese Miskimmon (born 1974) is a Northern Irish opera director who has been the artistic director of English National Opera since 2020. She previously held equivalent posts at Ireland's Opera Theatre Company (2004–12), Danish National Opera (2012–17) and the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet (2017–20).

Early life and education

Annilese Miskimmon was born in 1974 in Bangor, County Down, near Belfast, to Irene and John Miskimmon. She was educated at Glenlola Collegiate School in Bangor. She said in a 2016 interview with Fiona Maddocks that opera was "central" to her imagination as a child, characterising the form as simply a "really dramatic story with big music". She sang in the chorus of amateur opera productions in her teens, and she cites her father, who sang in amateur productions with Opera Northern Ireland and Castleward Opera, as an important influence. The first opera that she attended was an amateur performance of The Magic Flute in Belfast, at the age of ten. She said that opera, together with theatre, formed a "safe place for open-minded, creative people from both communities" during the Northern Ireland conflict.

Miskimmon read English at Christ's College, Cambridge (1992–95). There she was involved with the college's amateur dramatic society and the university's opera and Gilbert and Sullivan societies, starting to direct theatre and opera. She became president of the college JCR, where she led a campaign to protect first-year students from older ones. She then went to City University in London, where she studied arts management.

Career and productions

Early career (to 2004)

Miskimmon was a producer at Welsh National Opera, and also worked at Glyndebourne Festival Opera. An early work she directed was a 2000 semi-staged performance of Leonard Bernstein's musical On the Town at the Royal Festival Hall in London. In 2002, she directed a production of Tchaikovsky's The Queen of Spades (originally a Welsh National Opera production, directed by Richard Jones) with the Canadian Opera Company. With the Welsh National Opera in 2004, she revived Jones' version of Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel. The same year she directed Handel's Semele with the British Youth Opera at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London; Robert Thicknesse, in a review for The Times, commends some of Miskimmon's directorial ideas but feels that the production was "undone by overambition".

Artistic director (2004–2020)

In 2004, Miskimmon became artistic director at Ireland's Opera Theatre Company (2004–12). One of her first productions with the company was the European premiere of Daron Hagen's Vera of Las Vegas, which she directed with "pace and wit", according to Thicknesse. Chris Moffat comments in Fortnight in 2006 on the "originality and panache" of her reworkings of traditional operas with Opera Theatre Company, particularly praising her "racy" version of Monteverdi's The Coronation of Poppaea featuring "cupids on skateboards" as an "ironic" commentary on the opera's original audience.

Miskimmon then became general manager and artistic director of the Danish National Opera (2012–17). In 2014 she staged the rarely performed Massenet's Don Quichotte with the company. The following year, she staged an experimental version of Mozart's Così fan tutte, in which the audience selected both the type of staging and the interpretation of the ending. Hannah Nepil, writing in the Financial Times, considers that this "milks the ambiguity" of the ending, and underlines the work's focus on "choice, indecision and 'the road not taken'". In 2017 she became the director of opera at the Norwegian National Opera and Ballet (2017–20).

Freelance opera director (2004–2020)

Throughout this period, Miskimmon continued to work concurrently as a freelance director. In 2007, she directed a production of Mozart's early work, Il re pastore, in 2007 at Garsington Opera, which Geoff Brown, in a review for the Times, writes "teases enough to twinkle, but never to irk". The same summer she directed Offenbach's Bluebeard at Buxton Opera House, employing "immaculate comic timing", according to Hilary Finch in the Times. Later that year she directed the premiere of Julian Grant's children's opera, Shadowtracks, at the Royal College of Music in London. In 2009, she directed Handel's Orlando at Buxton, in a production set in a hospital ward, which, according to Finch, at times approached Doctor in the House but "comes into its own" with a shower of giant poppy petals that accompanied the central character's madness. In 2012, she directed Verdi's Falstaff at Opera Holland Park, in a production which Brown, in a review for the Times, criticises for a lack of humour and a confusing setting "mostly" in the 1920s that "mix and match references". Richard Fairman, in a more-balanced review for the Financial Times, describes the production as "hyperactive", with the comedy having a "cruel, rather manic feel". In 2014, she directed Britten's The Turn of the Screw with Opera Holland Park, in a production that the American critic Wendy Lesser describes as an "artistic miracle" in which "he unnatural, the unlikely, was clearly the rule of the day", also praising the spare classroom setting that facilitated the movement of the ghosts.

In 2018, Miskimmon's version of Puccini's Madama Butterfly at Glyndebourne unusually shifted the setting to American-occupied Japan in the 1950s; Rupert Christiansen, in a review for the Telegraph, comments that the choice lends "urgency" to Butterfly's plight, likening her to a "war bride". Christiansen, also in the Telegraph, criticises her earlier decision to give Handel's Semele a modern setting, in a 2017 production with Garsington Opera, writing that Miskimmon here "flounders" as a director and "blurs" the opera's "sly sexual politics", describing the staging as "littered with rather desperate visual ideas".

As well as giving a new slant to classics of the repertoire, Miskimmon successfully staged underperformed works. For example, in 2011, she directed Mascagni's L'Amico Fritz with Opera Holland Park, changing the setting from 19th-century France to 1950s America, a move that Christiansen, reviewing for the Telegraph, describes as "effortless, enlivening – and nicely cute"; Neil Fisher, reviewing in the Times, writes that the resetting "adds spice if not quite enough sense", describing the production overall as a "fruity delight for fans of verismo". Her production that year of Ambroise Thomas's Mignon at Buxton Festival is described by Andrew Clark in the Financial Times as embracing the period sensibility of the piece, "preserving the innocence of the story and sprinkling it with fairy-dust".

English National Opera (2020–date)

In October 2019, Miskimmon was appointed artistic director of the English National Opera (ENO), succeeding Daniel Kramer; at the time Gramophone described her as the only woman to lead an important opera company in Britain. She took up the post in May 2020 during coronavirus lockdown, and in September 2020, led innovative Drive and Live ENO performances of Puccini's La Bohème in the car park of Alexandra Palace, London, perhaps the first drive-in opera performance in Britain.

The choice of Poul Ruders' The Handmaid's Tale for her first conventional production at ENO in April 2022 is described by Nicholas Kenyon in the Telegraph as a "brave move... vindicated" by a "totally committed and communicative" performance that attracted a younger-than-usual audience. The production employed a simple staging that coupled austere sets with film denoting the character's memories, a contrast which Fairman, in a review for the Financial Times, found effective while Kenyon describes the set as "dreary". In a September 2024 production of Puccini's Suor Angelica that was among the Telegraph's top five operas of the year, Miskimmon moved the setting from Italy to Ireland's Magdalene Laundries.

She was elected an honorary fellow of Christ's College in 2024.

Personal life

Miskimmon is married. As of 2021, she lived in Surrey.

References

  1. ^ Fiona Maddocks (9 October 2016). Annilese Miskimmon: 'From an early age opera helped me escape the Troubles'. The Observer
  2. ^ Tina Campbell (4 April 2021). Annilese Miskimmon: National Opera leading lady 'proud' of NI roots. BBC News Northern Ireland (accessed 20 December 2024)
  3. ^ College News. Christ's College Magazine, pp. 28–29 (2024)
  4. P. H. S. (2 November 1994). No sex please. The Times (65101), p. 18
  5. ^ Lanre Bakare (8 October 2019). English National Opera names Annilese Miskimmon as new artistic director. The Guardian
  6. ^ Hannah Nepil (13 March 2015). Interview: Annilese Miskimmon, Danish National Opera director. Financial Times
  7. Geoff Brown (9 October 2000). On the Town: Festival Hall. The Times, p. 24
  8. William Littler (2002). Opera in review: Canada: Toronto: The Queen of Spades. Opera Canada 43 (4): 30
  9. Robert Thicknesse (1 March 2004). Opera: Hansel and Gretel. The Times (68011), p. 15
  10. Robert Thicknesse (10 September 2004). Opera: Cunning Little Vixen: Semele. The Times (68177), p. 23
  11. ^ Alex Marshall (8 October 2019). Beleaguered English National Opera Announces New Artistic Director. New York Times
  12. Robert Thicknesse (25 November 2004). Opera: Vera of Las Vegas. The Times (68242), p. 125
  13. Chris Moffat (2006). Virtual Opera. Fortnight (445): 17 JSTOR 25561721
  14. Geoff Brown (14 June 2007). Opera: Il re pastore. The Times (69038), p. 117
  15. Hilary Finch (11 July 2007). Opera: Roberto Devereux/Bluebeard. The Times (69061), p. 86
  16. Margaret Ross Griffel. Operas in English: A Dictionary, p. 444 (Scarecrow Press; 2012) ISBN 9780810883253
  17. Hilary Finch (15 July 2009). Opera: Mitridate: Orlando. The Times (69688), p. 89
  18. Geoff Brown (24 July 2012). This Falstaff needs more fizz. The Times (70633), p. 73
  19. Richard Fairman (26 July 2012). Falstaff, Holland Park, London. Financial Times
  20. Wendy Lesser (2015). Unnatural. The Threepenny Review (140): 27 JSTOR 24429843
  21. Rupert Christiansen (18 June 2018). The heartless GIs who inspired Mme Butterfly. The Daily Telegraph, p. 24
  22. Rupert Christiansen (4 June 2017). Romantic, witty and a little bit muddled. The Sunday Telegraph, p. 26
  23. ^ Neil Fisher (14 June 2011). Mad mensch or Mad Men? The Times (70285), p. 80
  24. Rupert Christiansen (13 June 2011). Chip-shop shenanigans take the shine off fine farce. The Daily Telegraph, p. 27
  25. Neil Fisher (4 June 2011). Opera: Critic's choice. The Times (70277), p. 135
  26. Andrew Clark (12 July 2011). Mignon, Buxton Festival. Financial Times
  27. Sarah Kirkup (9 October 2019). Annilese Miskimmon is appointed ENO's new Artistic Director. Gramophone (accessed 21 December 2024)
  28. Claire Jackson (17 June 2020). Country Life, pp. 96–97
  29. ^ Nicholas Kenyon (11 April 2022). Resonant tale of terror, fear, and a hint of love. The Daily Telegraph, p. 25
  30. Richard Fairman (11 April 2022). The Handmaid's Tale – one of the most powerful operas of the century. Financial Times
  31. It's time to put an end to the war on opera: Reverse snobbery has left this centuries-old art form in critical condition; to save it, let's stop the bigotry. The Daily Telegraph, p. 14 (14 December 2024)
  32. Nicholas Kenyon (30 September 2024). Haunting reimagining of Puccini by the ENO. The Daily Telegraph, p. 11
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