Met Opera: Maestri and Levine Team for a Joyful New 'Falstaff'

The world's favorite fat, foolish lover returned to the Metropolitan Opera stage last night in a new production of Verdi's Falstaff that with the splendid Anbrogio Maestri singing the knightly knave and the incomparable James Levine in the pit is an evening of pure delight. The new staging by the imaginative Canadian director Robert Carsen, which has already won acclaim at Covent Garden and La Scala, moves the setting from the mid-16th century to the mid-20th and serves as an enchanting reminder...