By Rupert Christiansen [The Telegraph, 8 December 2010]

Eva-Maria Westbroek is about to offer Covent Garden a spectacular double act. This month, she sings the saintly virginal Elisabeth in a new production of Wagner’s medieval romance, Tannhäuser. In February, she will do a total volte-face, creating the title role in Mark-Anthony Turnage’s new opera Anna Nicole, drawn on the pathetic life of Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith, who married an octogenarian billionaire and died in 2007 after a drug overdose.