Renault's Ancients

One of the major casualties of Covid for me has been the theatre, which I'm simply not up to going to as much as I was, so it was great this winter to go to two really good productions.

Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, Dave Molloy, at the Donmar Warehouse.
Musical based on War and Peace - wisely, on a limited chunk of War and Peace - finally making it to the UK in an excellent production. I'm so out of touch at the moment that I didn't know it was going to be on, but fortunately antisoppist did. I've no idea why it has taken 12 years (OK, Covid might have played a role there), because it is enormous fun. As the prologue tells us 'Natasha is young and Andrey' isn't here, but a lot of Moscow society is and taken up with entertaining itself at other people's expenses/being a miserable sod. Will Natasha's life be ruined for other people's idea of a good time? Will Pierre get a grip? Will anyone ever recognise (incuding Tolstoy) that Sonya is the MVP*? The singing and performances were excellent, production fast and sharp, and though it is not deeply moving, it tells its story very well. Surely some regional producing theatre must want to put it on? I'm baffled sometimes by UK theatre's curious resistance to the musical as a genre, despite the West End.

Plus surely the best piece in praise of a taxi driver in musical theatre.

The Flying Dutchman, Wagner, Opera North.
I went up to Leeds to see this with my father and sister a week after Great Comet, and I have to admit that about a minute into the overture I was thinking, 'Great Comet was excellent, but this is on another level.' Fabulous orchestral playing of a magnificent score, superb singing and acting, a riveting experience from start to finish. The production introduced some concepts of refugees, being lost on the sea and wandering, including voices of refugees speaking their experiences, that met with a mixed reception. Frankly, I didn't think it really added much to the main narrative, but I've come across infinitely worse opera production concepts, and the critical bafflement about this one seems out of proportion. It was a pretty straightforward production with an additional element, there was no obscurity of the main story, and making Daland a government minister ranks pretty low on "weird things that happen in opera stagings".

Much more distracting to me was something integral to the original. While I was aware of the basic story (sailor cursed to wander the seas coming to land only once ever seven years, unless he can be saved by the love of a good woman), and there is little more plot than that, what I hadn't realised was that the second act is basically this:

Heroine's father: So I've offered you to this rich creepy kind of ghost sailor for his money.
Heroine: I have read a million vampire fanfics, I am READY.

I am not kidding. Senta is literally the girl that people worry about reading Twilight, she is DTF the exotic erotic scary doomed creature, and Wagner thinks that this is cool.

Have you seen the ship upon the ocean
with blood‑red sails and black masts?
On her bridge a pallid man,
the ship's master, watches incessantly.
Whee! How the wind howls! Yohohe!
Whee! How it whistles in the rigging! Yohohe!
Whee! Like on arrow he flies on,
without aim, without end, without rest!
Yet there could be redemption one day for that pale man
if he found a wife on earth who'd be true to him till death!
Ah when, pale seaman, will you find her?
Pray Heaven, that soon
a wife will keep faith with him!
...
Let me be the one whose loyalty shall save you!
May God's angel reveal me to you!
Through me shall you attain redemption!

I sat there thinking what a pity it was that Wagner died too soon to see Nosferatu. There is also some wonderful sea music, and the Dutchman has a great aria, but honestly, it's Senta's batshit goth fangirlery that sticks with me.


*Credit to the Olivier Awards, who gave Maimuna Menon the award for best supporting actress.