Poignantly human - Mozart The Magic Flute, Castellucci, La Monnaie

Mozart Die Zauberflöte at La Monnaie /De Munt, conducted by Antonello Manacorda, directed by Romeo Castellucci.  Part allegory,  part Singspeile, and very much a morality play, Die Zauberflöte is not conventional opera in the late 19th century style. Naturalist realism is not what it's meant  to be.  Cryptic is closer to what it might mean. It is thus ideally suited to Romeo Castellucci's intelligent, literate approach, with multiple layers of symbols, not all of which might be obvious at first, but become more rewarding with each viewing.  His sets are elegant but don't operate on appearance alone. Castellucci is a director for those who care enough about opera to make an effort to penetrate beyond the surface.  Those who want opera to be "pretty" can be content, but they'll miss out on the real depths.   Please read more about three of his recent productions Salzburg Salomé, Munich Tannhäuser, and Henze's the Raft of the Medusa.    Like composers, and conductors and artistes, good directors have a vocabulary of their own : the more you experience, the more patterns emerge.

Catellucci's approach to Die Zauberflöte  is illuminating on many levels, a term which has more meaning in this case than usual, since illumination is a concept at the core of Freemason beliefs. Freemasons are "The Sons of Light", light meaning enlightenment, self-awareness and understanding an individual's place in a community.  Members undergo rites of initiation, facing challenges as they rise within the hierarchy.  Until very recently, secrecy was also part of the Freemason ethos, further emphasizing the concept that wisdom comes not as an automatic right for everyone, but only to those who make the effort to seek it out.  Elitist perhaps, but that kind of elitism is no bad thing.

Thus the Overture is played over a dark set where a man faces a single line of light and tries to grasp it. Other men appear, in strange non-human regalia, with a sheet of coloured cloth. It's evidently a reference to something, though one I don't get, which is part of the fascination of Castellucci productions : you don't need to know everything first time round, which in itself is the beginning of wisdom.  The darkness remains, but now is backdrop to props and costumes of lustrous whiteness: singers and actors move like dolls in an elegant music box, seen through a haze of fine gauze.  Roccoco elaboration against classical formality.  For more detail on the set, which is as beautiful as icing on a wedding cake, please see HERE.  he singers move in symmetrical patterns, suggesting at once the intricate layers in the plot and the idea that the characters’ fates are controlled by forces beyond their control.  The moon, the sun, the movement of planets in the universe and the traverse of time. Lots of feathers, too, evoking nature and the birds, and Papageno (Georg Nigl) whose job it is to trap and kill.  In Die Zauberflöte the Queen of the Night (Sabine Devieilhe) pits her wits against  Sarastro (Gábor Betz) and his confrères. Men versus women, an undercurrent that runs through the piece, which Castellucci, with his appreciation of the "Eternal Feminine", knows how to develop.

Thus the interlude between the first and second acts, separating the silvery night from golden day.  At first, the impersonal "song" of machines : three women are seen using breast pumps. Real women, who lactate.  the contrast between this intimate act of selfless nurturance and the hollow drone of the machine makes a point.   As the real music starts the milk is poured into a long tube - the tube which represented light right at the beginning.  This makes sense connected  to Sarastro's aria "O Isis und Osiris" which follows, which is an invocation to protect those starting out on their journey ahead. Castellucci then inserts spoken dialogue which also should not shock, since dialogue is part of the Singspiele tradition.  Women and men on two sides of the same stage, costumed as androgynes.   As they tell of the challenges they have faced in their lives, they become individual, with personalities and backgrounds.  Compelling testimonies about coming to terms with blindness and disfiguremernt. Many of these speakers are in fact real people, not actors, and they've faced challenges most of us may (hopefully) never meet.  So anyone in the audience who can't face these brutal truths therefore fails the challenges placed before them.  "We have passed through the Night. We are very close to freedom".  So don't anyone dare knock this scene or sneer at their courage, and Castellucci's decision to let them speak. The reason the dialogue is in English is, I think, because the speakers come from different countries, but are united by experience - another concept important to this drama.

More gold - more "light"- but androgyny still prevails, since enlightenment is not yet achieved. Georg Nigl's robust Papageno provides comic relief, of a sort, but the silvery tomes that accompany his song suggest the silvery tones of the night.  For much the same reason, the Three Knaben represent immaturity.  They have the innocence of birds, for they have not experienced challenge.  Tamino (Ed Lyon) and Pamina (Sophie Kärthauser) will, however, grow up in the course of the time as they face their destiny. Different couples - professional singers and amateur speakers - are seen interacting together, coming to "know" each other and themselves.  More symmetry still, and almost painful vulnerability.  A blind woman lets herself be touched, respectfully, by men whose hands are maimed : she has learned to trust, not to judge.  Would that more audience dared the same ! Then another surprise - the Narrator (Dietrich Henschel)! He finds himself alone.  "I am not myself, but still myself.  I have crossed another horizon", he says  "But I have you, silvery light, victorious over fire".  He calls out the individual names of the non-professional speakers, who surround him, some of whom are burns victims.  "You are the truth for me - you re-assure me".  Thus the bird-like freedom and innocence of the Papageno-Papagena duet that follows and the joyous ensemble, where all are united, women and men, Night and Day, mortals and (possibly) immortals.  "Heil sei die Geweihten! Ihr dräget durch Nacht!.....Es siegt die Stärke und Krönet zum Lohn die Schönheit und Weisheit mit ewiger Kron".  A fine cast all round, conducted by Antonello Manacorda, worthy of the challenges of this visionary yet powerfully human production.  Those who can cope with challenge can catch it here on arte.tv. 

Audacious Mozart Magic Flute ENO

Mozart The Magic Flute at the Coliseum could give the ENO a welcome boost. Simon McBurney's production is audacious  but absolutely true to Mozart's cheeky, irreverent generosity of spirit. Tamino and Papageno find Enlightenment (and the girls of their dreams) because they dare face the tests before them. Each takes the journey in his own way: the saga transcends time and place.  From Greek myth to Parsifal, even to Star Wars, the allegory refreshes itself in endless retelling. It is a universal voyage of self-discovery.

Simon McBurney and Complicité create dazzlingly imaginative theatre. Their A Dog's Heart was astonishingly vivid. The opera was a mess but the staging turned it into art. With Mozart, McBurney has infinitely better music, and rises to the challenge. As wer hear the Overture, we see a hand write words in chalk on a blackboard.  As the opera evolves we learn its significance. Words communicate. We see images of books on shelves, and  up to the moment mobile devices. The stage above the stage is a laptop or Notebook. It's suspended on wires from the roof and looks dangerously fragile, but that in itself has meaning. Finn Ross's' video projections are among the best in the business, and  extremely well integrated into the drama. Technology may change the ways we express ourselves, but if we don't communicate, or refuse to engage with each other, we're lost. At the end, chalk figures proclaim "WISDOM LOVE". Simple and austere but all the more powerful for that.

Technology changes in theatre, too. Film and computer-generated images break down physical restraints of production and free imaginative possibilities. The Magic Flute IS magic after all, not realism. It cries for cosmic flights of fantasy. McBurney's designer, Michael Levine, gives us the night sky in all its glory : myriad sparkling stars in the firmament. The Queen of the Night (Cornelia Götz) in this production isn't spectacular but the forces she commands most certainly are. Extra-terrestrial sound effects amplify the sense of cosmic spaciousness. Off-stage noises are a natural part of staging. Here they rumble at the edge of consciousness. Gergely Madaras seems spurred to conduct with strong, dramatic flair. This highlighted the quiet moments when the Flute (Katie Bedfiord) emerged.  The flute felt all the more magical and fragile. The Flute is more than an instrument. It is fundamental to the meaning of the opera. Like Papageno's bells, it evokes something pure,  primeval and plaintive. McBurney's staging was musically as well as visually astute. The "birds" that fly in these woods were pieces of paper fluttering like the pages of books. Like the Flute and the bells, economy of gesture expresses deeper meaning.
 
This staging is beautiful, revealing its charms obliquely, much as the Singspiel tradition  is more subtle than later forms of grand opera, and McBurney respects the vibe. The scene where Tamino and Tamina float, apparently suspended in space, surrounded by "birds" is magical.  The English dialogue is genuinely witty. Papageno (Roland Wood)  quaffs a bottle of Chateauneuf du papageno!

The singing and acting were also above average for the ENO, hamstrung as it is by the need to do operas in a language other than those for which they were written.  This cast delivered with panache, communicating their enthusiasm with style and wit, obliterating the lumpen ENO Die Fledermaus, killed not by the staging but by the performance.

Ben Johnson sang Tamino. He has stage presence..He even looks right, and creates a Tamino with  personality, doggedly battling the situation he's in. His firm, assertive singing showed that Tamino is not a spoiled princeling but a man of  character and resolve who can face what Sarastro, and the world, throws at him.

Roland Wood sang Papageno, ostensibly the lesser, low-born character in the opera but fundamental to its meaning. Princes abound in classical art, but Mozart gives us Everyman as non-hero in a strikingly modern way. From Papageno we can trace a line through to Siegfried and even to Wozzeck, a role taken by many good Papagenos, and one which Wood is  surely destined for. The Papageno songs are harder to carry off than they seem because a singer has to express the role's innate nobility while acting the inept Fool. Spontaneous applause after the Papageno/Papagena duet., and very well deserved indeed.  I didn't like the fake provincial accent and Little Britain connotations which English theatre is obsessed with, but Roland Wood's true personality shines through the disguise.

Mozart's arias for Sarastro are so resoundingly written that they evoke the idea of Sarastro as a figure beyond time, an acolyte, perhaps, of Egyptian gods. James Cresswell sang the part well, though he didn't quite suggest the complexity of the character: Sarastro has very dark sides. He's an unforgiving judge rather than a father figure. Cornelia Götz sang The Queen of the Night.  Here, she's no Darth Vader vamp, as in some stagings, but a surprisingly vulnerable woman. Her Ladies (Eleanor Dennis, Clare Presland, Rosie Aldridge) extend her part. Monostratos (Brian Galliford) conveys the  Alberich-like animalism, suggesting that he's a dark cousin of Papageno, gone bad.

 Devon Guthrie sang a lovely Tamina and Mary Bevan a spirited, lyrical Papagena. The Three Spirits were Alessio D'Andrea, Finlay A'Court and Alex Karlsson, costumed as ancients, whose Norn-like purpose they serve.

This Magic Flute might confound those who want their Mozart vacuous, but those who truly love the opera will get a lot from this highly individual, perceptive approach.

For more details check the ENO website . The production runs til 7 December - you'll want tickets!
This review also appears in Opera Today.