Boris Godunov/Mark Wigglesworth
Royal Opera House, January 29, 2026
Reluctant to rule, Boris Godunov cuts an arresting figure, not with his high-profile bragging but with his capacity for self-doubt. In the second revival of Richard Jones’s spectacular production of Mussorgsky’s masterpiece, all eyes and ears are on Bryn Terfel, who took the title role in the first two stagings and returns for this short run.
He takes his time appearing, this unwilling Tsar, when the Boyars demand he step up, Ivan the Terrible’s heir having died mysteriously as a child (murdered, some believe, by Boris). When he finally dons the lavish trappings of royalty, he is ill at ease, but rules sagely until famine turns the people against him.
The mighty Welsh baritone is at his best in this role, dominating physically while tentative in character, paradoxically most confident when expressing his uncertainties. Yes, he can fill the Royal Opera House with sound as well as fans, but a flawless, confessional pianissimo is what rings in the memory. Cutting a Lear-like figure as he staggers to a miserable end his fool is the Holy Fool, whose challenges to Boris are beautifully sung by Chinese tenor Mingjhe Lei. (Lei won the Song Prize at the Cardiff Singer of the World 2019 and made his RBO debut as Tamino in The Magic Flute last autumn.)
Boris (Bryn Terfel) comforts daughter Xenia (Hannah Edmunds). The Royal Opera ©2026 Mihaela Bodlovic
Royal Opera regular, Polish bass Adam Palka unpacks the dark past of Russia as the chronicler monk Pimen, literally struggling under the weight of history as he drags his storyboard painfully to its conclusion. Villainous Prince Shuisky is sung by British tenor John Daszak. For comic relief, cue Alasdair Elliott as a less than sombre monk Missail, playing the spoons as the other half of a double act with fellow monk Varlaam, sung by Belarusian bass Alexander Roslavets. Varlaam is nearly framed by insurrectionist and pretender Grigory (American tenor James McCorkle), but sings his way out off trouble. Both men are making their house debuts.
Also making an impression were Norwegian soprano Hannah Edmunds as Xenia, Boris’s bereft daughter, and British baritone Sam Hird, voice of the peasants; both are on the Jette Parker Artists scheme, seedbed of many of today’s leading singers.
Mark Wigglesworth, conducting the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House and the augmented Royal Opera Chorus, steers with skill a story with an unusual trajectory, the score blossoming lushly and portentously by the early highlight of the coronation and darkening with Boris’s decline.
Alasdair Elliott on spoons, as Missal, with Varlaam (Alexander Roslavets). Photo: The Royal Opera ©2026 Mihaela Bodlovic
Sets by Miriam Buether and costumes by Nicki Gillibrand similarly transform from sumptuous beauty, with lavish ceremonial wear for the 100-plus chorus and actors, to the daily drab endured by the vast majority of the population or favoured by those who eschew the high life. Arching over the stage is a gilded corridor of power, haunted by a vision of the dead infant Dmitry and by the scheming boyars. The bells that ring powerfully through the score are echoed in a repeated design motif on stage.
But it is Terfel’s performance that makes this production, first staged in 2016, one to catch with its current cast. The intervening 10 years have caused the troubled head that wears the crown to hang ever more wearily, the voice to question more achingly the unwanted, and possibly unwarranted, power. Today’s audiences are also viewing the piece in a different world context. They will inevitably enjoy comparing and contrasting leadership qualities, on stage and off.
Boris Godunov is sung in Russian with English surtitles. Further performances are on 4, 10, 12 and 18 February 2026.