Linbury Theatre
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| Hel (Marta Fontanals-Simmons) Images: Stephen Cummiskey/ROH 2019 |
Hel – Marta Fontanals-Simmons
Angrboda – Rosie Aldridge
Loki – Tom Randle
Modgud – Lucy Schaufer
Baldr – Dan Shelvey
Odin – Graeme Broadbent
Nanna, Thora – Elizabeth Karani
Actors and Puppeteers – Laura
Caldow, Stuart Angell
Timothy Sheader (director)
Paul Wills (designs)
Howard Hudson (lighting)
Ian William Galloway (video)
Josie Daxter (movement)
Sound Intermedia (sound design)
Aurora Orchestra
Jessica Cottis (conductor)
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The Royal Opera House’s choice
of work for the first new production in the splendidly redesigned Linbury
Theatre – not unreasonably, it seems to have lost ‘Studio’ from its name – is,
perhaps, a declaration of intent; it may certainly be received as such. Not
only is it a new work; it is billed specifically as ‘our first opera for
teenage audiences’. Following somewhat in the line of Mark-Anthony
Turnage’s Coraline – last
year’s premiere for children – Gavin Higgins’s The Wondrous Child, to another libretto by a children’s author,
this time Francesca Simons, seems to me to have a good chance of prospering not
only in that specific role, but also more generally. It is certainly a successful
first opera – from the Linbury, from Higgins, from Simons, and indeed from the
production team and performers, without which any single effort would likely
come to naught. Opera, we were reminded, is above all a company effort – which
should, of course, include the audience too. Let us hope, then, that plenty of
teenagers were among those who were able to secure tickets before the run sold
out; and/or that further tickets will be released, as often happens in
practice.
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| Baldr (Dan Shelvey) |
Many – though perhaps not so many
of us on the first night – will doubtless come to the opera through Simons’s
book ‘of the same name’, as Peter Cook and Dudley Moore might have had it. Not
that there is anything of ‘Little Miss Britten’
here; for not only is the plot drawn from Norse mythology, from the myth of
Hel, goddess of the dead; the libretto is distinctly on the Anglo-Saxon and
perhaps even the Norse roots of the English language. Had his English been
better, Wagner might have lauded the lack of Latinism. The immediacy, not to
mention the ‘earthiness’ of some of the vocabulary make particular sense in a
primaeval realm – and will surely appeal to teenagers of all ages in the
audience too. To a certain extent, staging and score work with that,
performances perhaps still more so; they also recall (to us), however,
consciously or otherwise, that we are no more Anglo-Saxons than we are Norse
gods. The false immediacy of which Wagner could occasionally – very occasionally
– prove guilty in theoretical, though never dramatic, writing stands always in
need of puncturing in our modern condition. That is not a value judgement,
simply an observation.
Simons knows that as well as
Higgins, as well as by director, Timothy Sheader and his team. And so, we are
reminded by the puppetry in the first half of the staging, actors and singers
lightly detached – this is not The Mask
of Orpheus, nor does it try to be! – from
their characters in some cases, as well as by Hel’s narration of that first
part, the later character recounting the deeds of the child-puppet her, that
even in – particularly in – a drama dealing with (supposedly) eternal gods,
time plays a mediating role. Again, Wagner of all musical dramatists could have
told us that – and does. Higgins offers much in the way of readily associative
and memorable leitmotifs in his score, as well as plenty of ‘atmosphere’ and ‘action’,
after a fashion that would surely make sense to teenagers – and others –
accustomed to the ways of film scores, without ever sounding ‘like’ film music.
Video and electronic sound help us shift between locations, for instance from
the gods realm in the skies to the place of Hel’s banishment, from which she
will bring about the end of the gods’ rule.
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| Angrboda (Rosie Aldridge) |
Leaving aside the
(understandable) exaggeration about what opera ‘is’, for it can be any number
of things, one knows what Simons means when she writes in the programme: ‘It
took me a while to understand how different writing a libretto is to writing a
novel. Opera is much more direct: people say what they think – repeatedly.
Opera is so heightened, it really is the perfect way to express the emotion and
epic sweep of myths about gods and giants, love and hate, as well as a young
girl’s journey towards creating her own life.’ To my mind – and increasingly on
reflection – Simons and Higgins achieve this with great success here. Pacing is
different too; the analogy Simons draws with a picture book – ‘the words need
to allow space for the illustrations’ – is interesting. Again, one senses a
true collaboration: between librettist and composer, of course, but also with
the production team and performers.
Marta Fontanals-Simmons gave a fine performance as Hel: half human, half corpse. Never sentimental –
she does not want mere pity – she involved us in her plight, her hopes, her
decision through sheer force and variety of vocal personality. Rosie Aldridge
and Tom Randle impressed and (not a little) repelled as her parents: those who
cursed her and ultimately the world by bringing her into it. Lucy Schaufer proved
typically compassionate as the giantess Modgud, keeper of the bridge to
Niflheim and the dead. Odin, king of the gods, received a sharply observed
performance from Graeme Broadbent, taking us plausibly from hauteur to downfall.
Dan Shelvey’s Baldr, as carefree and compassionate in tone as the lovelorn Hel
thought him, offered a performance both delightful and moving. The Aurora
Orchestra and Jessica Cottis could hardly have offered surer advocacy
in the pit.
