The Medium – Slide 04 ‘Madame Flora has set herself up in the remains of an industrial building whose steel beams hang twisted from above. When massive doors at the rear are opened, a battered skyline looms. Madame Flora becomes no mere crook, but an ageing woman struggling for survival after Armageddon.’

The Medium – Slide 24 ‘Joseph Flummerfelt’s grasp of the score is as sure as is Pascoe’s grip on the Guignol.’

The Medium – Slide 23 ‘Some of the opera’s most powerful and touching acting came from Gregg Mozgala as Toby … He’s the opera’s ultimate tragic victim, and not just because he dies in the end.’

The Medium – Slide 22 ‘Meanwhile, bullet holes in the walls let in light from the outside, forcing Flora to face the world she feared. “The dead don’t come back,” she cries piteously, but in vain: the ineradicable memories of World War Two proved that they did.’

The Medium – Slide 21 ‘Taking complete control over set and costume design, director John Pascoe has transported Gian Carlo Menotti’s most successful opera to a surreal, postwar setting that resonates wonderfully with the spiritualism and guilt that haunt the composer’s libretto and score.’

The Medium – Slide 20 ‘The set, designed by Pascoe, reflected the physical reality of Madam Flora’s world. Jagged shards of metal plunged through the roof, reminding us of the ruin outside. So when an inexplicable spiritual event broke through her cynical veneer, she collapsed in fear of this unknown force. Dever brought pathos to the character, and her bullying had a frightened edge’

The Medium – Slide 19 ‘Pascoe told me in our pre-festival chat that Gregg Mozgala is an aspiring actor born with a fairly mild, but still profoundly limiting case of cerebral palsy. His presence as Toby makes for a totally brilliant (and magical) casting coup. The result speaks for itself.’

The Medium – Slide 18 ‘Barbara Dever makes a strong entrance as Madame Flora into this crumbling world. Her character, too, is on the verge of collapse; powerfully sung, her depiction of Madame Flora was convincing throughout.’

The Medium – Slide 17 ‘The set’s elaborate and fantasy-ridden trappings positively reeked of postwar squalor and decay … Its details – both within and from without – were surreally à propos to the story: a pile of rubble off to one side, a grimy statuette of the Virgin Mary ringed by cockeyed candles, and the dim, ravaged cityscape beyond the doors.’