By Rupert Christiansen [The Telegraph, 20 September 2010]
Published: 5:56PM BST 20 Sep 2010

Welsh National Opera has imported from Bordeaux a two-dimensional staging of Beethoven’s Fidelio, directed by Giuseppe Frigeni. It eliminates virtually all the dialogue and strips the action to a skeleton, avoiding any pretence of realism. The first act takes place against the background of one wall of a salon of Beethoven’s era and two walls of a high barred cage; the latter forms the only scenery for the second act.