Entertainment

Incompetent ‘Comte’

Superb work by Juan Diego Florez as the count (here as a nun) couldn’t make up for Bartlett Sher’s misdirection. (Marty Sohl/Metropolitan Opera)

Take a sexy comedy, add Rossini’s scrumptious melodies, then fold in world-class singers and a Tony-winning director.

Now pray it doesn’t turn out like the sodden soufflé that is the Met’s new “Le Comte Ory.”

You can’t blame the material. For this 1828 romp about a randy nobleman so eager to conquer a chaste countess that he disguises himself as a nun, Rossini devised lilting arias and exciting large-scale finales. Even Tuesday night’s disappointing performance couldn’t take the luster off “A la faveur de cette nuit obscure,” a delicious second-act trio winking at the naughty situation of the nobleman, his page and the countess sharing a single bed.

It’s not the singers’ fault, either. As the skirt-chasing count of the title, Juan Diego Flórez wound his vibrant tenor around the most intricate coloratura with arrogant ease. He peppered the score with high notes both loud and soft, but the showstopper was his elegant, lyric singing, a delicate tendril of sound unfurling to the rear wall of the vast Met auditorium.

Nearly as impressive was Joyce DiDonato as the rebellious page Isolier, matching Flórez note for note in the vocal-agility department. Her slightly tart mezzo added a layer of vulnerability to the boy’s antics.

Though less than comfortable with Rossini’s virtuoso demands, soprano Diana Damrau sparkled in the Countess Adele’s weepy aria, which she adorned with a flawless diamond of a high E-flat.

Though mezzo Susanne Resmark and bass Michele Pertusi wobbled wearily in their authority-figure roles, baritone Stéphane Degout — in nun’s drag as Ory’s sidekick, Raimbaud — woke up a sleepy second act with a nimble reading of a patter song during which he gets a chorus of male “sisters” roaring drunk.

So, what went wrong? Well, Maurizio Benini’s limp conducting took a lot of the fizz out of the music, but the real culprit is director Bartlett Sher. The depth of emotion and visual flair he brought to Broadway’s “The Light in the Piazza” and “South Pacific” were nowhere in evidence in this tired retread of a “play within a play” concept, which was clichéd 50 years ago.

Michael Yeargan’s sets looked like something middle schoolers could knock together from cardboard boxes and shower curtains. But even they might have passed muster had Sher placed even a single witty scene before them. Instead, he settled for breast-grabbing, butt-groping and enough hammy business for actor Rob Besserer, in an extraneous role, to steal focus from every musical or dramatic climax.

Like Mary Zimmerman, Sher enjoyed a moderate success helming an idiot-proof opera at the Met — “The Barber of Seville” for him, “Lucia di Lammermoor” for her. Since then, they’ve phoned in bomb after bomb, but even Zimmerman’s notorious boo-magnet, “La Sonnambula,” wasn’t as rank as this discount “Ory.”