Most opera companies look askance at operetta as a little infra dig, and The Merry Widow has enjoyed poor treatment in both London houses within recent memory.

But Opera North has always taken operetta seriously, and it shows in this sparkling, clearly delivered new production by Giles Havergal.

With help from Kit Hesketh-Harvey, he delivers a new paraphrase of The Merry Widow, linking the financial crisis in Pontevedro with the Eurozone credit crunch – and a few impertinent digs at bankers to boot. They go down a storm.

Newly widowed Hanna Glawari has inherited a fortune worth more than the entire Pontevedrin GDP and threatens to bankrupt her country by marrying a Frenchman.

So its Parisian embassy mobilises its dissolute chargé d’affaires Count Danilo to wed Hanna instead. Unfortunately, the two have history: they are old flames. On such flimsy pretexts are operettas built.

But Havergal uses every card in the pack. After a picture-postcard look at Pontevedro during the prelude, he and his designer Leslie Travers give us tasty “ethnic” costumes along with the luscious period décor wherever possible. Choreographer Stuart Hopps – who has trained his charges superbly – keeps dance to the fore, native steps wherever the waltz allows. So the show has atmosphere to burn.

It also has the voices. Perhaps Stephanie Corley’s Hanna lacks that last dash of glamour on her first entrance. But she turns out to be a wily minx, always one up in her feigned disdain for Danilo, while realising his true feelings. Her soprano can be a little blustery, but her ending to Vilja, her patriotic song, is exquisitely sustained.

William Dazeley’s bluff Danilo is a lovable rogue and his baritone is well capable of handling what is really a buffo tenor role. The two parry each other's wit teasingly.

The secondary affair between Valencienne, the ambassador's wife, and man-about-town Camille de Rosillon is more than usually serious, their Act 2 encounter especially poignant. Amy Freston’s lively – and later athletic – Valencienne and Allan Clayton’s superbly sung Rosillon (luxury casting, this) interact vividly.

All through the cast there are fine cameos, and Richard Burkhard as attaché Kromov (subsuming the speaking role of Njegus) connives wittily with the audience, turning any amount of blind eyes to diplomatic howlers.

The girls from Maxim’s and six professional dancers kick up a storm, helped by much evocative lighting from Oliver Fenwick and an orchestra under Wyn Davies that is always alluring.

I defy anyone to leave this show without a smile on their face and a tune in their heart. But hurry.

The last performances are tomorrow and Wednesday.