Everything to this point in the role of Fedora assumes the presence not of a great singer, but of a great actress, a woman of notable glamor and a sexual magnetism that whets the male appetite on the instant, whose technical virtues as a singer enable not great feats of vocalism, but the filling in of Giordano’s setting with all the interpretive emotional complexity and urgency that the composer apparently assumed she would provide, thus relieving him of the onerous responsibility. I don’t mean this in an entirely negative sense. He was writing for what he perceived as a modern kind of singing actress, a  Bernhardt/Duse combo, in what he perceived as a modern kind of opera, through-composed and thus without the profile of discrete numbers to help define interpretation. And to whatever extent he can be said to have succeeded, it was in terms of a “modern” that is no longer modern (the through-composed “formlessness” is intended for the kind of realistic enactment then coming into fashion), and an Italian one, at that. Thus, the “interlude” is really a scene in pantomime. The actress is meant to convey, by pantomimic means, both the indicated “business” of the scene and the progression of Fedora’s inner state. But of the latter, the composer has provided only the dreamy, sentimentalized side.

Now, though, things do begin to change. When Loris returns, Fedora loudly accuses him of being a Nihilist hit man. “Who, me?” he answers, and he now relates the story of his passionate involvement with the enchanting serving-girl Wanda, the discovery in flagrante of his buddy Vladimiro’s perfidy, and his case-dismissed settlement of the matter. In the course of this narrative, there are two passages (“Mia madre, la mia vecchia madre” and “Vedi, io piango“) which, while hardly among the Great Tenor Moments, are more compelling than anything Fedora’s been given to sing. The rest of the act is given over to the now-enlightened Fedora’s desperate efforts to keep Loris with her for the night (the signal has sounded) so that he doesn’t find himself unconscious or worse on a slow boat to St. Pete, and the melodious union of the lovers. This doesn’t last long, but we do finally get some old-fashioned love duet writing with a strong theme and juicy opportunities for good soprano and tenor voices.

Apparently Fedora has worked it all out on the morning after with Gretch and his boys, since by Act 3 we are removed to the Swiss Alps, where the happy couple is installed in a nice Bernese Oberland chalet where flowers are picked, tea is served, a ragazzo sings a sad song with accordion about the sweetheart who will never come back, and horn and flute send pastoral calls down the valley. Loris is anxious, because for too long he has had no word from his mother or brother. Olga and De Siriex have tagged along. There is some pseudo-sophisticated banter while Loris goes to check on the mail, but at length Olga flits away on a bicycle excursion, and De Siriex is left to disclose to Fedora not only the fatal outcome of her letter of denunciation (Loris’ brother has been arrested, then drowned in his cell when the Neva overflows; hearing of this, his mother has suffered a heart attack and died), but a warning that news of these calamities is about to arrive in the next post. This is a strong scene, with a menacing little motif in the low strings driving it along and the baritone’s declamation well laid out. Fedora sings a brief prayer for mercy. Loris gets the news and soon dopes out that the new love of his life is the betrayer. He denounces her violently; she gulps poison; there is a Death Scene. If we have Puccini in mind, or for that matter the Giordano of Andrea Chénier, we will not hear remarkable inventiveness in this final sequence, or anything emotionally transcendent. But it is solid enough to be effective, even moving, in the right hands.