With the third of its spring offerings, Opera Australia again demonstrated the overall strength of the ensemble and the consistently fine playing of which Orchestra Victoria is capable.

 This Falstaff is a revival of Simon Phillips’s production, first performed in 1995 (Adelaide) and starrily led by Bryn Terfel in 1999 (Sydney), his first Falstaff. Hugh Halliday is the ‘revival director’. The production needs little resuscitation. Everything about it – from Iain Aitken’s entertaining sets to Tracy Grant Lord’s costumes – is absorbing and harmonious, and it looks good on the wide Melbourne stage. At times there were dozens of people – romping or mocking or scheming – but this effusive clutter always worked to comic effect, especially during the hilarious scene in Act II when those merry wives of Windsor bundle the duplicitous knight into an appropriately large washing basket and have him dumped in the Thames.