Lina Cavalieri (1874-1944)

"TALES OF HOFFMANN."
BRILLIANT REVIVAL AT THE LONDON OPERA HOUSE
Produced at The Opera House, London
Reviewed in The Daily Mail (London) - 27th december, 1911.

Mr. Hammerstein delighted his huge audience last night, and will no doubt delight many more with his contribution to the holiday spectacles - a brilliant revival of Offenbach's popular and pleasant comic opera, "The Tales of Hoffmann," at the London Opera House.

Each of the three heroines of the romantic Hoffmann's love-stories was impersonated by a prima donna of distinction. Miss Felice Lyne was the doll Olympia, to which the hero first loses his heart, and she was perfectly suited by the part. She trilled with the utmost clarity, and it was no wonder the assembled guests afterwards exclaimed, "Quelles gammes!"

The lithe and beautiful Mme. Lina Cavalieri was the traitorous Giuletta in the Venetian scenes - the scene in which the need of something more gripping than Offenbach's wholly superficial strains is most keenly felt. The consumptive heroine Antonia of the third tale - the opera dates from days when phthisis was a romantic and not a notifiable disease - was Miss Victoria Fer, who sang the elegant little romance "La Tourterelle" very agreeably.

Mr. Frank Pollock, the Hoffmann, had not previously been seen in so large a part. He is a light tenor with a voice which is pleasant but of insufficient variety; he was rather embarrassed by the histrionic demands of the part.