A Night of Song and Caesar

Opera Santa Barbara’s new production of Handel’s Caesar & Cleopatra reshaped the Lobero stage into a luminous vision of ancient Egypt under director and designer Josh Shaw.

Framed by Helena Kuukka’s sculptural lighting and Stacy Logue’s opulent costumes, Shaw’s staging balanced Baroque spectacle with exotic locale. Props by T. Theresa Scarano and makeup by Heather Sterling completed the immersive aesthetic. 

At its center stood Colin Ramsey’s Cesare, commanding and vocally assured, navigating Handel’s demanding writing with amplitude and control. Anastasia Malliaras’s Cleopatra proved agile and dramatically quicksilver, tracing the queen’s shifting identities with musical imagination. Kelly Guerra’s poised Sesto and Christina Pezzarossi’s warmly burnished Cornelia added emotional depth, while Logan Tanner, Matthew Peterson, Alexandra Bass, and Christopher Walters rounded out a cohesive ensemble.

Conductor Emily Senturia led with rhythmic lift and transparency, sustaining the opera’s tension between public power and private feeling. By curtain call, the Lobero once again became what it can be at its best: an intimate civic theater transformed into mythic space.