The eponymous philanderer’s first attempt to seduce the wife of an absent crusader knight is meant to take place outdoors in the lea of the Countess’s castle where Ory has set up shop as an itinerant guru. Here director Denis Podalydès and designer Éric Ruf move us into a small church where Ory holds court amid a clutter of chairs, confessional box, pulpit and caretaker’s closet. This Ory also goes largely undisguised: an odd stratagem for a wanted man whose pursuers are hardly likely to be fooled by a judicial wig and false nose. Nor is Act 1, with its milling crowd scenes, especially well staged. Much of the acting is under-directed – never a good thing when there are close-up cameras on the prowl – nor is there much rhythm to the stage business.

In Act 2, which takes place inside the castle, everything is better done. Ory is effectively disguised as the amplest of nuns, while the Cistercian simplicity of the castle hall offers an ideal acting space. The orchestra pit doubles as the imagined cellar, from which the roistering nuns (soi disant) haul up their cache of vintage wines, and the great nocturnal Trio for Ory, the Countess and Ory’s page Isolier is beautifully played on a discreetly lit plinth that doubles as the love-nest. Musically, too, the Trio is finely done.

The Opéra Comique’s Francophone cast is led by Julie Fuchs’s sweet-toned Countess, with Gaëlle Arquez as the sporty young blade Isolier, and Philippe Talbot as Ory. Talbot is excellent, though I can’t understand why he muffles many of Ory’s glistening high Cs. This is a period-instrument production deploying the excellent Orchestra des Champs-Elysées; yet, whatever may have been written to the contrary, the original Ory, Adolphe Nourrit, would have been a full-voiced performer in a recognisably modern style.

Conductor Louis Langrée first worked on Ory as an assistant to John Eliot Gardiner on his Lyon Opéra recording (Philips, 10/89 – nla). Again, Act 2 goes beautifully, where Act 1 is rather lacking in lift and continuity. The Tutor’s set-piece scene doesn’t help, especially when, as here, the singer rather struggles to make it seem pertinent.

Of the several DVD rivals, it is the Zurich Opera staging by the A list team of Leiser and Caurier, with Javier Camarena and Cecilia Bartoli in the leading roles, which continues to have pride of place. There the time-shift is not, as here, to the France of Rossini’s time but to France in the 1950s; so it’s from the Algerian wars, rather than the Crusades, that the all too susceptible womenfolk await their husbands’ return. The Zurich production also uses period instruments but is even better conducted.