Review: Wexford Festival Opera, Falstaff and What Happened To Lucrece 

Live concerts may have been cancelled, but Wexford has still managed to hit the spot with some impressive productions

Francesca Federico and Rory Dunne in Falstaff Chronicles, at Wexford Festival Opera 2020.  Picture: Pádraig Grant

These are bleak times for opera companies with grand plans scuppered by the tiny, invisible destroyer. The lights are out at the mighty Met Opera for now, al fresco performances have petered out as winter approaches and televised performances are the order of the day in many centres. 

Wexford Festival has made a virtue of necessity and embraced technology to deliver an imaginative programme that preserves the original Shakespeare theme, repackaged in formats inspired by Netflix and television sit-coms.