Will Waspe's Whispers
So Peter Hall, to whom congratulations (and my apologies for under-estimating him), is not, after-all, to be a yesman of the Donald Duck administration at Covent Garden. The public prints have done much speculating about the reasons for his decision not to accept the co-directorship of the Royal Opera, it being clear that the official reason is a half-truth at best. Of course, he cannot do the job to his satisfaction in the twenty-six weeks a year allowed by his contract — but the length of time is immaterial. He cannot do the job properly at all without the artistic freedom necessary to do it — and the single instance I cited last week, of his Tristan and 'solde production being subordinated to the guest appearance of prima donna Nilsson, is enough to show that as long as the administration remains ga-ga at the feet of expensive foreign singers, ' then in any conflict between a director's aims and a star's whims, the director is a sure loser.
Hall's co-director, conductor Colin Davis, was interestingly quoted by the Observer. "I have no personal grude against Peter," he said, going on to say that personally he had admired 'the first act' of Tristan, and to wonder whether Hall might have found the whole opera too big a job to cope with. "There's a lot of tedium involved in producing opera. Maybe that's what Peter found out." And would someone else be appointed? "When you have offered a man loyalty, friendship and half your kingdom. you don't do it again lightly."
With friends like Davis . . .
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