Ope r a Gloriana (Grand Theatre, Leeds)
Paradise regained
Rupert Christiansen
It's been a bad autumn here. Dull stag- ings of Lohengrin and Meistersinger. A mis- fired Zauberflfite, a misconceived Boheme. The sherbet foam of Cendrillon. Only the ENO's lean, taut revival of The Rape of Lucretia has showed any real integrity. I haven't been enjoying myself. Then sud-
denly lightning strikes, twice within a week, and the air clears. Perhaps opera isn't just a big waste of my time and public money, perhaps I'll tear up my letter of resignation from this column, perhaps I'm actually quite fortunate to have access to all these free tickets (no, I'm not altogether joking).
The first cause of my galvanising change of heart was the London Symphony Orchestra's concert performance of Les Troyens. This was a stupendous event. All the force, fire and fury of Berlioz's epic were thrillingly realised through Sir Colin Davis's conducting; I missed only some of the grace notes (the chorus `Gloire a Didon' could have been warmer, for example) and occasionally regretted the decibel level (as when the Trojan brass band drowned Dido's final rapt cry of 'Rome immortelle'). Otherwise I was gripped, and the cast did splendidly, introducing me to three excep- tionally promising young talents: Markella Hatziano (a grave Dido), Vladimir Boga- chov (a trumpeting Aeneas) and Carlos Alvarez (an elegant Choroebus). Jane Hen- schel's Cassandra, powerful as it was, could not efface memories of Felicity Palmer in the same role at the Proms a few years back.
Opera North's production of Britten's Gloriana was even more exciting. We all know the (not altogether true) story of its flop at the Coronation, but I wonder whether deeper responsibility for its 40 years of neglect might not lie with those who have pushed an auteur theory of the composer's work — their implied argument being that because the plot does not deal directly with Britten's sexual predilections,
the opera failed to ignite his creative imagi- nation and serves instead as evidence of his
putative servility to the Establishment. My own view is that Gloriana is vastly more successful than its predecessor in the Brit- ten canon, Billy Budd, a piece which oozes a creepy homoeroticism and yet sounds hollow and rhetorical in comparison; and you could also say that Britten does find the imprint of his crisis in the scenario, envisaging Elizabeth as a figure prevented by her public persona and the moral law from acting out her desire on a young and unobtainable object which she must even- tually destroy in order to survive (like Cap- tain Vere in Billy Budd, some would add).
What matters, surely, is that Gloriana works. In Leeds it emerges triumphantly as Britten's essay in Grand Opera, on the Verdian scale, if not model (I doubt whether he could have heard Don Carlos at the time of composition, but Aida is not far away at times), telling the story of Eliza- beth and Essex in boldly contrasted tableaux. William Plomer's libretto touched though it is by 'Cease thy prating, saucy Worcester' clichés — is sympathetic but not congratulatory: in the Royal Box it may have seemed more like a challenge or a warning than a compliment. And if Brit- ten's score is richer in melody and ensem- ble than it is in any other of his operas, I cannot believe that this was because he was writing down to the tastes of his first-night gala audience; it was simply the result of what he considered appropriate to the breadth and character of the opera's can- vas.
Phyllida Lloyd's staging makes no special pleading for the work, providing a direct interpretation, faithful to the text yet exu- berantly inventive. Against Anthony Ward's beautiful set — basically a tilting- yard surrounded by galleries and high walls — she brings out all the opera's pageantry with as much conviction as its intimacy. The big moments are as boldly seized as the smaller ones. A great gilded horse car- ries Essex off to Ireland; Elizabeth gently toys with Essex's long black hair as he sings the exquisite 'Brambleberry' lute song; the scene of the Masque at Norwich has an endearing amateurishness; and there are many touches of humour to pepper the nobler emotions, the politicking and pro- cessing. The high standard of acting throughout, the cast, the gorgeous costumes (Ward again), inventive choreography (Kate Flatt) and lighting (Rich Fisher) all make important contributions to this mag- nificent achievement.
The performers did it justice. Josephine Barstow's long-awaited impersonation of Elizabeth I depicts a game old bird of the Joyce Grenfell variety. Perhaps she misses some of the terribilita — and the spinto expansiveness — which Jessye Norman
might bring to the role, but her sincerity counts for more: this Elizabeth remains human and credible throughout, and her playing of the great last scene left me in a dreadful state. As Essex, Thomas Randle lacked deliquescent sweetness of tone, but
scored in sheer hot-headed sexiness, while among the rest of the excellent cast, I par-
ticularly admired Susan Chilcott's Pene- lope Rich — why, however, was her stunning outburst in the penultimate scene taken at such a plodding tempo? This was one of several moments when the conduc- tor Paul Daniel seemed to be holding back, as though he wasn't altogether confident of his orchestra.
Never mind; mere rough edges which time will smooth down. This wonderful opera — as strong as anything Britten wrote between Peter Grimes and Death in Venice — comes to Covent Garden in February and then tours to Nottingham, Hull, Norwich and Manchester. It should not be missed by anyone whose faith in opera has been tried, or indeed anyone who believes in opera at all.
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