Royal Opera House

This is a great addition to the ROH site. Beautifully decorated in classic style it is intimate allowing you to see the performers close-up. Seats for our performance of Acosta Danza Up Close were around £30. A bargain compared to standard ROH tickets. Naturally you also benefit from all the facilities of the ROH but with easier access. Certainly well worth a visit.

Oh dear. For well over a decade, we have enjoyed a meal in the Amphitheatre Restaurant before the ballet.
Earlier this month we paid £185 for an indifferent meal for two with limited alcohol. The service was adequate but everything else substandard. We decided not to eat there again.
Sadly, the ROH has simply not got its act together post-covid. On our previous visit the Amphitheatre cloakroom was not open while the restaurant was: we had to sit with the coats on the back of the chairs. On this occasion it was opened, after we asked at 1730 and the grudging staff member made it clear she was doing us a favour. Programmes at £8.00 no longer include a cast list, and you are invited to download a QR code.
Mercifully the performance was as exquisite as ever – marred only by a delay because of a scenery malfunction.
This is our most expensive evening out. Room for (considerable) improvement!!

I took my daughter to her first Opera in December for a performance of Tosca.

Covid protocols were in place requiring masks to be worn at all times. We had amphitheater seats which are not the most comfortable but it was the cold that I really noticed. The large vents in the roof were open and between the masks and temperature it would have been a thoroughly miserable experience. It was saved by an excellent production of Puccini's masterpiece though I did think the staging was a little pedestrian.

£15 for a glass of champagne and no alternatives makes and expensive evening very expensive indeed.

A wonderful event guided by a very experienced professional, Amandine, who despite being very young was confident, clear and entertaining.

I went on this Tour with my child, aged six, and we both thought it was wonderful (we both like opera). It gives you a good idea of the historical background, what happens behind the scenes in terms of stage setting, costumes, artists' training (we could see a ballet class in action).

I thoroughly recommend it if you like opera or ballet or both.

My kid too would like to add a few words: the tour was AMAZING and Amandine was very knowledgeable

Prior to my visit I was concerned about sitting in a fully booked theatre with the growing risks associated with Covid. I was reassured by the information provided by ROH that the wearing of masks/face coverings was required.

This was also announced before the performance (Giselle - stunning and breathtaking!!!) began.

BUT - where were the masks?

I was surrounded by maskless people, and it appeared that ROH were doing nothing to reinforce this requirement. There was also no obvious requirement to participate in ‘track and trace’.

Given such a large, international audience in such confined (albeit beautiful) proximity, despite wearing my own mask I spent much of the performance feeling rather vulnerable and that the risk of covid was not something being taken seriously either by ROH or by my fellow theatre goers.

While walking around Covent Garden we found the Royal Opera House. The security guard who checked our bag as we entered was so welcoming and friendly. We were able to walk around the lower level where they had a gift shop and a café. The main entrance is on Bow Street. This is home to the Royal Opera and the Royal Ballet. We were able to watch ballet performances on the monitors in the main lobby and to see some costumes on exhibit. We really wish we had time to take a tour, but we did not. We will certainly plan to do this on our next trip.

We are both opera lovers from Australia. After an excellent dinner at Clos Maggiore on 12 November 2019 a visit to the ROH for the Magic Flute seemd a perfect way to round off our fourth night in London.Not so. And not so by a long way. Our two 70GBP tickets turned out to be a bench without a back. The theatre was unbearably hot. The orchestra sounded disinterested and the performers lacklustre. If these are the standards of what is said to be one of the world's great opera houses then the ROH should lift its game. We left at the interval without hesitation.If you want a really lovely opera experience come to our Sydney Opera House and have a magical night out on the Harbour in a theatre that delivers on all of the counts that the ROH most certainly does not. A major disappointment in an otherwise wonderful holiday in London.

Cosi Fan Tutti

I have been keen to see this opera for a long time and so bagged the best possible seat for this production.

The music is sublime and the cast were wonderful is each of their roles. Fabulous voices.

The staging however was minimalistic and confusing. The opening period is conducted in front of closed house curtains like a Morecambe and Wise show. Frequently the stage was empty with just a few props including at one point, a mannequin with glasses which were indeed wiggled up and down at a la Mr Morcambe!

When there was staging it varied from cast off pieces from the musical 9-5, to a tree of life complete with serpent, through to 1930’s broadway. It was a mess and provided no visual accompaniment to the music and voices, indeed it was, a distraction and by the end of act 1 I found it really annoying.

Cosi is a comic opera and the cast played on this well but the staging meant they too seemed to be a bit lost at times. The ROH stage is vast and a solo performer, performing from the rear in clothing that blended into to the minimal set, almost vanished. Deliberate metaphor? Perhaps! But it just left me bewildered.

I can’t help wonder if in an attempt to recover lost pandemic income that low budget staging is being resurrected to allow multiple productions to be produced and staged in a short period.

With a £230 seat bagged for just £50 via a brilliant Time Out offer I got my first ever close up here rather than my usual spot in the cheap seats.
The difference was not a surprise, a better view, better clarity etc etc but being able to see the facial expressions up close was stunning.
Madam Butterfly a difficult opera in modern times but this is a well thought out version.
Star performances a plenty but when it was announced before curtain up that the lead lady was I'll but had decided to carry on one wondered what impact this would have. No one needed to have worried, what a star and a phenomenal reception at the end clearly provoked an emotional response. Brilliant.

This review is for Royal Opera House the tour. This is a tour that claims to take you backstage and yes you go into a few rooms. You spend the majority of the time in the wardrobe. You get the sense that if you stare at the clothes too long you're going to get told off. You CANNOT take any photos in these areas. I kind of understand that there would be a LOT of poor photos and videos taken, but for artists such as myself getting some photos would have been nice. You can't even sneakily do this as the volunteer like some sort of North Korean solider stands BEHIND you the whole time. I really wanted to love this tour, but you get to see NOTHING, some corridor's as you get to be shuffled through. You get next to no time and the only things you can photograph are the boring hallways before you go backstage. Granted we did get to see a rehearsal in the auditorium, but this was by sheer luck. The only plus point was our guide who was very friendly and knowledgeable and clearly loves her job. If this was free or perhaps £5 it would be worth it, but £20 is taking you for a ride.