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Lyrics
Duncan
(After Obey)
Conducted by
Paul Daniel
Directed by
David McVicar
Designed by
Yannis Thavoris
Lucretia
Sarah Connolly
Tarquinius
Christopher
Maltman
Female Chorus
Orla Boylan
Male Chorus
Timothy Robinson
Collatinus
Clive Bayley
Lucia
Mary Nelson
Bianca
Catherine
Wyn-Rogers
Junius
Leigh Melrose
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English
National Opera
at the Barbican
7
- 8 November 2003 |
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The Rape
of Lucretia
is a strange work in a number of ways.
Most obviously, the story of Tarquinius
leaving his friend Collatinus outside
Rome, riding into the city and proceeding
to rape Collatinus' wife Lucretia, precipitating
the latter's suicide, seems unusual
in the context of a number of Britten's
other stage works in focussing on the
sexual relationships between men and
women - perhaps not entirely convincingly.
Also
surprising is its musical style: although
it was written during the first half
of 1946, hard on the heels of works
such as Young Person's Guide to the
Orchestra and Peter Grimes, it sounds
very different. The claim in ENO's recent
publicity material that the opera 'is
set to Britten's most lyrical score'
is a dubious one. The orchestration
for 10-piece chamber group is predominantly
spare in tone, with the accent on angular
percussion and woodwind, seeming much
closer to the sound-world of later works
such as the Nocturne from the late 1950s,
or even to the brittle style of Stravinsky.
For long periods, the singers are accompanied
by piano alone. Britten's trademark
harp provides occasional mellifluous
relief, as in the scene following the
rape when, ignorant of what has happened,
Lucretia's two servants enjoy the morning
sunshine. But the music never seems
to attain the level of inspiration and
memorability Britten achieved in his
greatest works. In operas such as Grimes,
Billy
Budd or
(another chamber opera) Turn
of the Screw,
passages of intense beauty draw the
listener in and establish acute sympathy
with the central characters with whom
such passages are usually associated.
This never seems to happen in The
Rape to
the same degree.
The sense
of being kept at arm's length by the
music is accentuated by the role of
the chorus figures in the opera. The
use of choric voices to comment on the
action is of course frequently deployed
in literature and drama, and draws in
particular on a classical device apt
for the subject matter. Britten himself
employs a chorus-like narrator in other
works, e.g., the anonymous prologue
grippingly launching the 'curious story'
written in faded ink' of Turn
of the Screw,
or the elderly Vere opening and closing
Budd. But, as in the 1931 Andre Obey
play on which the libretto is based,
narration and comment are provided all
the way through The Rape by two such
figures, a man and a woman, who are
on stage from beginning to end. Both
are dislocated from the temporal framework
of the story (which we are told takes
place 500 years before the birth of
Christ) and subject the action to a
Christian interpretation. Whilst the
moral homilies after the rape scene
are to some extent undermined instrumentally
by what Ansermet (who conducted the
first performance at Glyndebourne) called
'the rhythm of copulation' in the score,
the Christian commentary seems intrusive
in the epilogue which Britten asked
his librettist Ronald Duncan to add,
ending the piece unsatisfactorily.
Making
the best of the choric characters, however,
is one of the strengths of the revival
of David McVicar's 2001 production for
ENO at the Barbican (7 & 8 November
2003, transferring to the Grand Theatre
de la Ville, Luxembourg, 20, 21 & 22
November). Strongly sung by Orla Boylan
and Timothy Robinson, the latter clutching
a bible/prayer book, they are sidelit
throughout and although they move in
their white suits among as well as outside
the action, their separation from what
is going on is always clear. At one
moment, the male chorus comes face to
face with Tarquinius, who stares straight
through him.
The 'real'
action is lit more naturally and richly,
and set on a raked dark terracotta dais
with a long oval trench used by Tarquinius
and his two fellow soldiers in Act 1,
and filled with autumn leaves to form
Lucretia's fatal bed in Act 2. The sword
with which she will commit suicide protrudes
ominously from one end of the trench
throughout. Behind is a long low oblong
window, used to silhouette figures and
objects in the outdoor scenes, and filled
with a tilted mirror reflecting the
action from above for the rape scene.
During the latter, lighting (by Kevin
Sleep based on Paule Constable's original
design) is again very telling - the
soft half-light of Tarquinius' initial
seductive approach suddenly changes
(with a whip-crack in the orchestra)
to a more brutal light when his violent
intentions become clear, and then at
the moment of the rape itself, a line
of spotlights across the back of the
set mercilessly yet mercifully blinds
the audience.
The singing
is excellent in this production. Sarah
Connolly is a true-voiced and graceful
victim although she looks rather too
English and matronly. One has no real
sense of the undercurrent of erotic
attraction to Tarquinius which the libretto
would have us believe she feels when
she sings 'In the forest of my dreams
/ You have always been the Tiger' -
Tarquinius' lascivious comment that
'the cherries of your lips / Are wet
with wanting' seems more like wishful
thinking. This is not necessarily Sarah
Connolly's fault entirely - one of the
uncomfortable aspects of The
Rape is
the rather clumsy heterosexual stereotyping,
particularly in the earlier sections.
The men are drunken and animalistic
('Panther agile and panther virile''),
the women bland and domesticated, spinning
and apparently enjoying the elaborate
linen-folding we see in the first act.
This stereotyping does allow for some
good dramatic effects - towards the
end of the linen scene, we hear quiet
galloping percussion, and are gripped
without any need for words by the sense
of Tarquinius' imminent arrival.
But the
absence of a real sense of any emotional
participation by Lucretia in her encounter
with Tarquinius is a flaw. Without it,
her suicidal 'shame', and her inability
to accept her husband Collatinus' offer
to forgive her if her 'spirit' was not
involved in the previous night's coupling,
are unconvincing.
Catherine
Wyn-Rogers as Lucretia's nurse Bianca
gives a beautiful and characterful performance.
She transforms the rather mannered scene
which closes the first act where the
characters repeatedly wish their surprise
visitor Tarquinius a good night: Wyn-Rogers
delivers her apparently ceremonious
'Good Nights' to the prince with a stern
look and an emphasis which indicate
she has sensed that he is after more
than a comfortable night's sleep and
that Lucretia's far-away look could
spell trouble.
Best
of all is Christopher Maltman as the
royal rapist, his firm, focussed, ripe
baritone perfect for the role, a vocal
performance which (coupled with his
physical intensity and presence) was
completely convincing.
And one
could hear every word Wyn-Rogers and
Maltman sang, which was not always true
of the other singers - a shame, given
the literary interest of Duncan's libretto.
There is surely an argument for surtitles,
even with operas in English, as words
inevitably get lost especially in passages
of ensemble singing.
The instrumentalists
conducted by Paul Daniel played tightly
and well apart from an unfortunately
sour cor anglais solo which spoilt the
poignant scene when Lucretia eventually
emerges on 'the morning after', one
of the more beautiful sections of the
score (another of which was spoilt by
the jangling Nokia tune of some idiot
in the audience who had failed to switch
off a phone).
In general
this was a performance which did as
much as (and in some ways more than)
one could reasonably expect with what
must be seen as one of Britten's problem
offspring.
Nicholas Armstrong |
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