Giulio Cesare review – nightmarish take on Handel has snakes, sadism and a mummy

The Grange festival, Northington, Hampshire David Alden’s blackly comic Kafkaesque production has a strong cast whose lively performances were not always matched by the Early Opera Company in the pit The year 1724 found Handel at the very height of his popularity. Giulio Cesare, written for a handpicked cast of the finest singers, may lack the psychological depth of Tamerlano, the year’s other premiere, but rarely had the composer come up with such an infectious score. A gung-ho tale of colonial conquest, it is ripe for sending up politicians with a hankering for foreign intervention. Here, ho

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