Step into a forest where guardian angels light the night, sand pours from sleeves, and even the knives on the wall sway to the music, and you’ll know State Opera South Australia has brewed something special in Hansel and Gretel. This production leans into the opera’s gentler, Adelheid Wette-shaped fairy tale, wrapping her brother Engelbert Humperdinck’s luscious score in a staging that’s as cunning as it is sweet, with Jonathon Oxlade’s rotating set and Bernie Tan-Hayes’s atmospheric lighting shifting the mood from dewy morning to looming danger in a breath, all under the ambitious and stunning direction of Constantine Costi.
Engelbert Humperdinck’s score is lush and as with all State Opera South Australia productions, the score is performed live by the superbly talented Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, conducted by the company’s Artistic Director and Conductor Dane Lam. Under Lam’s precise direction, the hidden orchestra deftly managed the score’s dense, Wagnerian proportions. He maintained a careful acoustic balance throughout the performance, ensuring the heavy brass and rich textures blooming from the pit did not overwhelm the delicate vocal lines of the young leads.
The set and costume design by Jonathon Oxlade is incredibly clever and versatile. The stage features a circular platform surrounded by a rotating ring. The tall trees remain centre stage but the rotating rings allows for the hut in which the family live to appear and disappear without needing to have lights down. It also lends to a comic walking away scene. The witch’s house into which the children become entrapped is much smaller than expected when we first see it, particularly when compared with the close-up we get of the family home. However, it is huge and prison-like once the children have been lured inside. A grey, cement-coloured wall descending from the ceiling of Her Majesty’s Theatre becomes the backdrop for what separates the children from the outside at that point on.
Lighting designer Bernie Tan-Hayes, who did the light design on the company’s Roméo and Juliette last year, has created atmospheric lighting that take us from the early morning in the forest to the looming impending danger with deep red lighting as the witch approaches, amid the haze.
There are some key differences between the Brothers Grimm tale and composer Engelbert Humperdinck and librettist Adelheid Wette‘s version of Hansel and Gretel. In this version, there are no breadcrumbs showing the path the children have taken. There are no indicators for the lost children to find their way home. This opera version also has characters that are not in the Grimm version of the story, including 14 guardian angels performed by the Children’s Chorus for this production (in a very special scene holding lanterns in the forest); the Dew Fairy and the Sandman, these two roles both performed by South Australian emerging artist Lucy Stoddart. She sings with a luminous, finely controlled soprano, entrancing not just Hansel and Gretel on stage as the sandman but the audience too. These benevolent nature spirits were added by Adelheid Wette to make the dark, terrifying forest feel safe and magical for children, marking quite a departure from the darkness and scariness of the Grimm’s version.
There is a lot of whimsy and magic in State Opera South Australia’s Hansel and Gretel. From the dew fairy who comes sprinkling red glitter to wake the children to the sandman from whose sleeves sand pours to lull the children into a slumber. In addition to the whimsy and magic is the humour to be found in State Opera South Australia’s Hansel and Gretel. During one of the pieces in Act 3 when the children are trapped in the witch’s house, even the knives hung upon the concrete kitchen wall begin to swing to the tune.
American soprano Sofia Troncoso (who sang Pamina in State Opera South Australia’s The Magic Flute last year) sings Gretel. Korean-American mezzo-sopranist, now a naturalised French citizen, Kangmin Justin Kim sings Hansel. The two of them bring the heft and endurance these deceptively demanding roles require, while keeping a childlike lightness. Their on-stage dynamic as sister and brother is a joy, particularly the early scene where Gretel has dressed her brother up in a dress and lipstick. Their complicity in protecting themselves from the witch is convincing.
Catherine Carby, who sings both the role of the downtrodden mother and the witch, is superb with the audience getting to see her versatility through both roles. Not only is her singing perfect, her facial expressions express so much. She is equally convincing in each role but an absolute delight to see as the witch.
Morgan Pearse makes a very memorable entrance in Hansel and Gretel singing that he is “here! Bring happiness and glory!” with the aria Ral La La La, Ral La La La, Heissa Mutter, Ich Bin Da! His role is small but memorable, and his relief at finding his children alive is palpable.
State Opera South Australia’s Humperdinck’s Hansel and Gretel is being programmed along with Sondheim’s Into the Woods over the next week, with the two shows sharing the one theatre over different nights. For a company to mount two productions over 9 days is incredibly rare; to have the two occupy the one theatre over that time is quite a feat.
The production’s magic lies in its balance: benevolent spirits and sparkling mischief set against a score that turns the forest from safe to sinister in a breath. For first-time opera-goers and seasoned opera regulars alike, State Opera South Australia’s Hansel and Gretel is a spell that works: well-sung, cleverly staged, and just dark enough to satisfy. Don’t wait until the oven’s too hot to book your seats!
5 CROISSANTS
Matilda Marseillaise was a guest of State Opera South Australia
KEY INFO ON HANSEL & GRETEL
WHAT: Hansel & Gretel
WHERE: Her Majesty’s Theatre, ADELAIDE
WHEN: 3 shows remain:
- 7:30pm Tuesday 25 August,
- 7:30pm Thursday 27 August, and
- 7:30pm Saturday 29 August 2026
HOW: Purchase your tickets via this link
HOW MUCH: Full priced tickets range from $79 to $199. There are $35 tickets available for under 30s.
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For other events with links to France and the Francophonie happening this month, check out our What’s on in August
