Victoria.

Pacific Opera Victoria's season-closing Don Giovanni was an entertaining visual romp, partly from Glynis Leyshon's refreshingly askew direction and partly from ebullient performance values.

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Even if she didn't score a bull's-eye with every move, Leyshon's take was based on a canny grasp of the opera's myriad theatrical possibilities. Setting it in 16th-century Spain as an ecclesiastical trial of Giovanni, against John Ferguson's looming, church-inspired sets, punched up the dramatic atmosphere a notch or two. However, having the "jury" (members of cast and chorus) constantly observing from the stage edges was distracting: either one watched the onlookers and ignored the leads or focused on the leads and ignored the onlookers, making it pointless to have them. With an ensemble of such vivacious and gifted singers, who had hit stride by the Apr. 24 performance, one would not want to miss any of the highly kinetic interaction between them.

Baritone Gregory Dahl was a Don Giovanni to be reckoned with, the kind of guy you love to hate while envying him all the same. He physically and vocally dominated the stage when he was on it, yet gave a finely nuanced portrayal of a libertine who is thoroughly convinced his womanizing ways are precisely what the world needs. Anything but a robustly charismatic Leporello would be overshadowed completely by such a potent Don, but bass-baritone Terry Hodges shone in the role. Alternately broadly comic and faux dramatic, he was always believable as the Don's long-suffering servant.

Both in supremely mellifluous voice, sopranos Monica Huisman (Donna Anna) and Frederique Vezina were ideally cast (Donna Elvira). Benjamin Butterfield's light, lyric tenor was perfect for Don Ottavio, as much the antithesis of Giovanni in scruples as in animal magnetism. Phillip Addis was simultaneously amusing and endearing as the bumbling Masetto, while Michele Bogdanowicz, a pert and effortlessly melodious Zerlina, is definitely a young singer to watch for. Bass-baritone Gary Relyea, in typically resplendent voice, was an imposing Commendatore.

From the overture's ominous opening chords, conductor Timothy Vernon's near-perfect sense of the opera's ebb and flow kept the stage action bubbling along. The orchestra, fleet and nimble, responded to his direction with the keen fusion of drama and gaiety that Mozart's timeless dramma giocoso requires.