It could be years before we see a light-hearted production of Die Entführung aus dem Serail again. While relations between the Christian and Muslim worlds may be no laughing matter these days, does Mozart’s comic Singspiel really have to be played as a po-faced treatise on love and the religious divide? Christof Loy’s highly praised production from Barcelona squeezes every last drop of comedy from the piece. This is to be a serious psychological drama and the pace is punishingly slow, every drooping line of dialogue strung out with long, meaningful silences, just as in the Herrmanns’ similarly gloomy production conducted by Harnoncourt.

The setting here is the present day and Loy typically favours a bare stage to focus attention on the issues. Osmin sits at an office desk, a handkerchief over his head in the midday heat. A lone table, set for dinner and adorned by a single large candelabra, awaits Konstanze and Selim in Act 2. A mix of Western and Turkish costumes offers some colour at the start, but by the end everybody is dressed in identikit white shirts and black trousers/skirts. Has Western civilisation won? Or is the moral simply that we are all the same underneath?

The musical performance deserves better than this. Diana Damrau scored a notable success as Konstanze and her accomplished singing of a difficult role (she sings the extended version of ‘Martern aller Arten’) is the main highlight of the performance. Christoph Strehl’s Belmonte is stylish and sensitive, even in the often-cut ‘Wenn der Freude Tränen fliessen’, but the voice lacks expressive ‘juice’ at the top. Olga Peretyatko’s Blonde, played as a pert secretary who never smiles, and Norbert Ernst’s earnest Pedrillo deliver what the production demands, as do Franz-Josef Selig’s Osmin, happily not the usual Turkish caricature, and Christoph Strehl’s grave Selim. Ivor Bolton gets lively playing at uncontroversial speeds down in the pit but it is the hang-dog spoken dialogue that sets the tone. Those who lauded Loy’s production will be pleased to see it preserved on DVD. Personally, I find it depressing to watch the wit and life being drained so completely from Mozart’s opera.