No 41 -- Spring 1993 Edited by Michael Walters
The theatre looked about a third full. I came to this this production with what I hoped was an open mind, but not unprepared, for I had already heard a lot, none of it complimentary. The programme contained articles by Arthur Jacobs on Sullivan, David Russell Hulme on the opera, and Janet Howarth (who?) on feminism, but (perhaps significantly) nothing at all by producer Ken Russell on the production itself. The implication was that it was self–explanatory. Wrong.
The afternoon started well, the overture was excellently and majestically played, and the curtain rose on what looked like a holiday camp in which the decor consisted largely of ears. Most of the chorus wore oversized ears. I didn't understand that. The scene was said to represent a buck'n'yen palace, whatever that is. It would appear to be a theme park where American and Japanese money is accepted – but then why was Hildebrand dressed as a Scotsman? Most of the setting was colourful but garish, with a fairground of revolving cups, a waterslide, etc. Quite pretty, but inconsequential, and having nothing to do with the opera. But I did not find Act 1 objectionable, as I had found the DOC GONDOLIERS, merely rather silly and childish. One almost wondered why they bothered with the unnecessary embellishments of words and music.
The singers had a grim time. It was sad to see a bass of the calibre of Richard Van Allan (Hildebrand) made to trot about in a garment which bore no more than a passing resemblance to a kilt, and in a role in which his voice was woefully wasted. Mark Curtis (Hilarion) had to sing "Ida was a twelvemonth old" to an accompaniment of two live puppets who popped out of boxes and re–enacted the betrothal of Hilarion and Ida. Miraculously he got through it very well, but I doubt if anyone was listening. Gama (Richard Suart) was a Sushi–King, which seemed to be a Japanese equivalent of a Burger–King, made his entrance from the flies inside a gigantic fishburger, and spoke and sang in a somewhat intermittent Japanese accent, which made the words of his songs unintelligible. His sons seemed to be a cross between Hell's Angels and Sumo wrestlers, who for some inexplicable reason had a fondness for squirting each other with aerosol cans.
The dialogue was heavily cut, and the words of a number of the songs altered. However, for the most part the diction was not good enough for me to hear what the new words were. Act 2 was set in the Tower of London, with a White Tower which spun round like a teetotum, and a Bloody Tower that dripped with blood. The inhabitants were all dressed in designer female versions of Yeomen costumes with flared skirts. Hilarion, Cyril and Florian arrived by a submarine which came up through a manhole, and when Ida fell into the "river" she fell down the manhole, apparently into a rat–infested sewer, but curiously there was no trace of the rats when the three men had arrived, nor was there later in Act 3 when Gama entered the same way, complete with goggles and flippers. Particularly nasty was the Act 2 opening chorus, with an effigy of a naked man (dressed only in a fig leaf) stretched on the rack and finally pulled apart in the middle, with all his guts spewing out. "Sick" is the only word I can use to describe this. It reminded me of the (true) story of the small girl who was taken on a tour of the Tower. After seeing all the torture equipment she said in a loud voice, "But when are we going to see them getting their heads chopped off?" It was illogical that the girl graduates, having witnessed this disgusting scene without turning a hair, should have suddenly become squeamish in Act 3 at the thought of chopping of "real live legs and arms". But then in this production, logic seemed to find no place.
"The Ape and the Lady" received very silly treatment as a ballet with men in ape faces wearing top hats, white ties and tails. Hildebrand arrived inside a teapot, and some of the fairground cups made a second appearance. "Now wouldn't you like to rule the roast" was sung utilising an absurd crow glove puppet, the purpose of which entirely escaped me. Blanche also sported a crow on her hat and on the top of her staff of office. The silliest moment, however, was "This helmet I suppose" which made no sense, as the brothers had nothing much to take off, contenting themselves with discarding crash helmets, and a few arm and leg bands.
The score was prepared by David Russell Hulme, but I know of no textual authority for the extraordinary cadenza sung at the end of "Come Mighty Must". At #2.50 with no photos of the production, but a lot of irrelevant ones of Royal Holloway College, the programme was a rip–off!
James Holmes conducted the superb orchestra; the cast, without exception, was excellent, and it is to their credit that they did justice to Sullivan under very difficult conditions. Mark Curtis (Hilarion), John Graham–Hill (Cyril) and Geoffrey Dolton (Florian) were an excellent trio, the putting on of the female garments was splendidly done, and with a great sense of humour. A nice touch was to have Florian whip off his flaxen wig when he reveals himself to his sister. I fortunately missed Nickolas Grace as Gama, Richard Suart was infinitely preferable, though strait–jacketed by the concept of the role. Michael Druiett (Arac) was rather upstaged by the outrageous behaviour of his brothers Graeme Broadbent and Alan Ewing, both of who were obviously thoroughly enjoying themselves. As Ida, I saw Sarah Pring, rather a slip of a girl with a voice that spread on top, but good nevertheless. Anne–Marie Owens was a leather–clad Psyche with a whip, Jill Pert a formidable Blanche.
All in all it was interesting, I must admit I smiled several times, and it could have been a very good production indeed, could a suitable stage work have been found to accompany it! Neither PRINCESS IDA nor any other Gilbert and Sullivan opera was or is such a work. MICHAEL WALTERS
[Apparently, according to The Independent on Sunday (quoted in THE TRUMPET BRAY, Nov/Dec 1992) the opera is supposed to be set in the year 2002. Buckingham Palace is a theme park. Hildebrand is Prince Charles, and Hilarion Prince William. Cyril and Florian are gay lovers who "can't wait to get into drag". None of this was clear from watching the production, nor was it explained in the programme. The concept of Gama was altered because "We no longer laugh at cripples" (did we ever?) which merely betrays Russell's failure to understand the character Gilbert created. Ed.]
Having been brought up on "traditional" productions of G&S, I am, nevertheless, certainly not averse to "modernisations". I loved The Black Mikado, the Drury Lane Pirates and Jonathan Miller's black and white "Grand Hotel" Mikado, as well as some more adventurous amateur productions over the years. [I'm glad she said that. Ed.] Ken Russell has become increasingly notorious in his direction of films – a far cry from the beautiful films on Delius and Elgar for TV's Monitor. During the 80's he turned his hand to opera, in Europe and America, but this is his first in London.
There has been much publicity about the outrageous updating of Act 1 to Buck and Yen Palace and Acts 2 & 3 to Ida's University in the Tower of London. I didn't much like the exaggerated ears on everyone and everything in Act 1 but I did think the tea cup roundabout and the slide looked like great fun. So often the chorus stand around idly to "search throughout the panorama". Here with binoculars and cameras they had some purpose and all the movement was beautifully choreographed to the music. I thought the two levels of the Tower worked well and the trap door was used imaginatively for the arrival of Hilarion and his friends in their subterranean craft. How often I have thought it ridiculously contrived that 3 sets of student costumes should be "just there" for the boys to use. How much more dramatically sensible to have three sunbathing students frightened off, leaving their costumes behind. [But then the three students would have realised their costumes were missing, and the boys' disguise would have been "rumbled" much sooner. Ed.] The boys attiring themselves in the said student costumes during the trio "I am a maiden" was so much more successful than the more usual hasty scuffle beforehand.
As to the individual characterisations, I felt that some came off more successfully than others. Richard Van Allan's King Hildebrand as an older Prince Charles was rather a non–event without much presence. Hilarion, Cyril and Florian worked well together – particularly in their disguise complete with blonde wigs. The tall John Graham–Hall particularly made an excellent Cyril – I last saw him as Albert Herring! I didn't see the point of Sushi–King Gama – the cod Japanese accent just made his dialogue difficult to hear and his daughter Princess Ida was so actually English. Rosemary Joshua had strength and confidence. Anne Collins brought a lot of humour to the sometimes boring Lady Blanche. Her interpretation of the thankless "Come Mighty Must" was most entertaining. Lady Psyche is often a lighter version of Lady Blanche or an older version of Melissa. Here the vivacious Geordie Anne–Marie Owens made her a really individual rumbustious character – I think she really revelled in the thigh boots and whip! Not content with the transfer of one gorilla from last year's Die Fledermaus, Ken Russell had a chorus line of them complete with white tie and tails for a most amusing "Ape and the Lady". King Gama's three sons, Arac, Guron and Scynthius, were pseudo–Japanese or rather Japanese–American footballers. This gear worked well [sic] for the stripping off in "This helmet I suppose".
The score for this production was put together from the original autograph score. I am not sufficiently familiar with the usual version (without a score in front of me) to pick out the differences, but what was apparent in all the orchestral playing was a clarity and firmness, particularly in the strings, and Jane Glover's deft handling of Sullivan's wonderful rhythms. If one felt too outraged by the peculiarities of the production, one could close one's eyes and enjoy an excellent musical performance. I have friends who loathed it and others who loved it. For me, parts were eye–opening and entertaining; others were merely irritating. DOROTHY LAWSON
Misogynist Gilbert took Tennyson's proto–feminist poem The Princess and turned it upside down as operetta [sic]: "A woman's college? Maddest folly going!" The result was to saddle Sullivan's score with a libretto which was virtually out–of–date when it was born (1884). It is inconceivable that any major company should now want to deliver the piece as Gilbert left it. [A controversial point! Ed.] So one might welcome ENO's willingness to rewrite – but not recompose – the operetta, aiming the arrows of satire at the feminism of today and at today's theme–parking "heritage" industry. Enter, alas not with arrows but with a blunt instrument, Ken Russell. Nowhere evident was the razored skill with which other hands contrived THE RATEPAYER'S IOLANTHE and THE METROPOLITAN MIKADO at the Royal Festival Hall in 1984–5. While those productions were (to use the jargon of today) libretto–driven, the new PRINCESS IDA is concept–driven and is energized chiefly by the cartoon–like exuberance of James Merrifield's scenery and costumes. The royal Buck 'n 'Yen Palace offering fairground rides, the descent of the litter–scattering Sushi–Fast–Food tycoon on a monstrous fish, the Tower of London turned over to "feminist" studies including torture of males – such strokes of comic imagination are a joy.
But Ken Russell as producer does not match them in narrative invention. He fills out some of the jokes amusingly – contrasting the traditional English cuppa with the Japanese tea ceremony – but just as often obscures the point. Gilbert's artfully witty song proclaiming woman as a "radiant being" while a man "at best is only a monkey shaved" is expanded into a production number with a mute chorus of dancing "apes" who do not, in fact, illustrate the narration of the lyric. Why, we wonder, is Ida herself not Japanese like her Sushi–King father and her Sumo–toughie mountain–biking brothers? What motivation for giving Melissa, one of Ida's followers, a Welsh accent (not always intelligible), though her mother has none? How is it that the hero's companions, camped–up homosexuals at first, later pair off with women as in the original?
The re–writing of Gilbert's lines both spoken and sung is likewise clumsy and inconsistent. The Homeric reference to "Lady Circe's piggy–wigs" is replaced by "Mr. Gummer's piggy–wigs" but such an obscure Victorian allusion as "He paid a guinea to a toilet club" survives. The instruction to "get them Bowdlerized", apt when Ida's students were originally directed to study Ovid and Juvenal, is nonsensically retained even though the study–texts are now the Hite Report and Germaine Greer. The final denoument with its shower of references to "New Age Man", "cosmic one–ness" and even "Let's face the music and dance" must have embarassed the performers. Minor points, like the replacement of Gilbert's authentic "rule the roast" by "rule the roost" (falsifying the rhyme) also jarred.
Among individual performers to be savoured the best was Richard Van Allan's transformation of our present Prince Charles into a kilted King Hildebrand, with the royal ears figuring ubiquitously as his symbol. The role was sung, acted and spoken to perfection, not least in catching Gilbert's blank–verse Tennysonian metre. Less happily realized was Hildebrand's foe, King Gama, who ought in this context to have been a caricatured Japanese in the most abrasive Spitting Image manner. Nickolas Grace was not nasty enough, nor comic enough, and despite what appeared to be the use of a body–microphone not sufficiently dominant in voice for his "crushing repartee". As Hildebrand's son, Hilarion, betrothed to Ida in infancy, Mark Curtis sang neatly enough. He was outshone, however, by the large, joyous presence of his fellow–tenor John Graham–Hall as Cyril, who with Florian (the reliable Geoffrey Dolton) accompanies Hilarion in the invasion of Ida's stronghold.
The heroine's is the vocally problematic role of the piece. Ida is young (the age exactly fixed at 21), idealistic, ardent. But her character of moral leadership is embedded in two short, highly intense solos, "O goddess wise" and "I built upon a rock" – the first actually labelled aria in the score, a rarity in G&S, and both in E flat, which alternates with G as anchor–key for the whole operatic structure. The dramatic weight needed for these songs is such that the D'Oyly Carte company used often to engage an outside artist for the role. Rosemary Joshua's performance lacked that weight, though the voice and personality are otherwise pleasant enough. Anne Collins, by contrast, fitted exactly – into the role of the scheming Blanche. One only wished that Gilbert had provided a less opaque text for her one solo ("Oh, weak Might Be! Oh, May, Might, Could, Would, Should!"). Nerys Jones sang prettily as Melissa.
Vinyl–clad, whip in hand, Anne–Marie Owens got full comic and vocal value out of the transformed role of Psyche – no longer Gilbert's skittish juvenile, but the eager disciplinarian of Ida's establishment. Comic zest likewise animated the portrayal of Ida's brothers (Michael Druiett, Graeme Broadbent, and Alan Ewing, as Arac, Guron and Scynthius) – so much so that one could almost accept Druiett's rather underpowered delivery of "This helmet I suppose". This famous pseudo–Handelian number of Sullivan's, in which the hero dis–arms to fight, suffered some adjustments to the melodic line representing, presumably, Jane Glover's rather impertinent thoughts on how parodied Handel ought to sound. In general, however, Glover's conducting of the whole score was well judged, alert to detail but avoiding that exaggerated nuance which is the temptation of "grand opera" conductors when let loose on operetta. Musically, at least, the show had much to offer, not least in revealing the subtlety of Sullivan's softer–grained ensembles. It significantly honoured a composer who has perhaps been less than sufficiently garlanded during his 150th anniversary year. ARTHUR JACOBS
[Although I do not always agree with Arthur Jacobs' views, I thought that, one or two minor points aside (which will be obvious from reading my review), this was a superbly written criticism, which underlined expertly, just what was wrong with the production. Ed.]
Web page created 6 September 1998