A glorious aural and visual treat!
I am so pleased that I took 'the risk' of booking to see Philip Glass's opera at ENO and I am now kicking myself that I didn't book to see it more than once. It is on next Monday and Tuesday, and if I wasn't going away to Manchester, I would be attempting to get a ticket to see it again. SO of course, I hope it gets revived. I do know that it transfers to the the Metropolitan Opera in New York next season, and if I were living in the Greater New York area I would definitely go.
And I am now considering ways of non-violently protesting the destructive attitudes of the so-called professional critics and who attended the first night with closed minds, ears and eyes and damned a production and performance that ranks as among the most exciting I have seen.
My criticisms are really that from my cheap - and not too comfortable - seat at the front of the balcony, I could not properly see the words projected onto the wall - as an integral part of the performance, and would have appreciated them being on the surtitle board. My other criticism was that they got the timings spectacularly bad - allegedly, taken off the CD which is cut. It was supposed to finish at 10.35, but didn't finish until 11.10, after 'Time' had been called at The Chandos next door, and perhaps inconvenient for people with trains to catch back to the boondocks. The half seven start did mean that in theory I had time to complete my report following my closure meeting, but other events emerged to take my mind firmly off audit...
One viewing is not enough to do justice to what was a busy performance. The music was the best bit. I just don't get people who don't get it. I have to say that I have never made much of an effort to get to know Philip Glass's music, even though people have repeatedly told me have repeatedly told me have repeatedly told me that as a Steve Reich fan, I should be a Glass fan. And that's my bad; one that I should remedy forthwith.
It's basically through-composed, no real arias or other 'number's'. It seemed to me that the strings, especially the violins, never stopped playing, and, outside, I heard someone complimenting the flautists for their indefatigableness. Mesmerising minimalism - or repeating patterns. I found such beauty within such music. I suppose, because there are styles of music I don't 'get' I should have more sympathy for those who don't get minimalism. I suspect that, because I get it so easily, it's ultimately not very challenging for those who prefer their music to be impenetrable and unmelodious.
The production was spectacular.The sets were simple and basically the same in each of the three Acts - a curved corrugated cardboard backdrop, in which were doors high up. About halfway through each Act, these doors were opened and in turn, Tolstoy, Tagore and King, sat there. The floor was a linoleum made up of a quasi-mosaic of colourful pictures. Very little furniture, and certainly none abused.
Visually, the crowning glory was the puppetry, especially that controlled by the stilt-walkers, who displayed an ethereal beauty of movement - I loved the way they have to keep in perpetual motion to maintain balance and did so with elegance of movement. The puppets included a man and woman made of newspaper, like papier maché 'pantomime' dragon made of baskets and Ganesha. There were also some grotesque people with stooped bodies and ugly enormous gargoyle-like faces that I think if I were young and impressionable might be the cause of recurrent nightmares.
The cast was not exactly starry but were of a consistently high standard:
M K Gandhi - Alan Oke
Miss Schlesen - Elena Xanthoudakis
Mrs Naidoo - Janis Kelly
Kasturbai - Anne Marie Gibbons
Mrs Alexander - Jean Rigby
Mr Kallenbach - Ashley Holland
Parsi Rustomji/Lord Krishna - James Gower
Prince Arjuna - Robert Poulton
Conductor - Johannes Debus
Director - Phelim McDermott
Assoc Dir/Set Design - Julian Crouch
Costume Designer - Kevin Pollard
Lighting Designer - Paule Constable
(it's no accident I also include the technical credits!)
Not a weak link in the entire ensemble - I was even pleased at Jean Rigby, who has consistently displeased me. Elena Xanthoudakis sounded gorgeous - no surprise having heard her in a small role in Carmen down the road. But the stand out star was Alan Oke, who sang throughout with beauty and feeling. He was an extremely convincing as Ghandi - it cannot be easy portraying one of the great iconic figures of history. Sorry, I don't know whether there were any high Cs hit-and-held in an unmusical macho display. But, surely, his performance, and the production overall, must be in the running for the next round of awards.
