Review: ELEKTRA AT THE CAPITOL
As Baroness Thatcher once said in very different circumstances: ‘Rejoice!'
Sydney at last has a theatre able to do justice to grand opera and
the demands of Gesamtkunstwerk. Having enjoyed the success
of Elektra so much at the Capitol, can it be much longer before
the Sydney theatre-going public take up arms against the sea of troubles
that swirl around the opera theatre at the Sydney Opera House? With
its fetching Yves Klein-blue ceiling - just like the original - and
comfortable seating, the newly refurbished Capitol rose to the occasion
of these performances magnificently. I went twice and found the sound
more covered downstairs underneath the circle than up above, but all
the seats seem to have a good view of the stage, and the pit is able
to contain the larger orchestra needed for Wagner and Strauss. I could
do without the stuffed birds, the train rumbles and the ice-cream
vendors selling their wares inside the theatre five minutes before
curtain up, but who's complaining when we now have such a substantial
and flexible theatre to hand. Subsequent performances by the Nederlands
Dance Theatre showed how suitable a venue the Capitol will be for
ballet too - what a stimulating festival Leo Schofield gave us this
January.
I am no critic, so I will just say that I found the singing and playing
during the two performances I attended quite splendid. The production
was not my cup of tea - and I like challenging productions - but I
know people who loved it. Lang seemed to want to intellectualise what
is, for me, Strauss' most original and disturbing work. I felt
a musical catharsis, but not a theatrical one. The emotions of the
singers seemed too contained, but of course that could have been the
intent of the production. There is something to be said for letting
the music say what the characters on the stage cannot portray: the
enormity of overwhelming emotions. Perhaps the idea was: the house
of Atreus has already sent each character to their doom along predestined
lines laid out for them by the Erinyes (was that what those lines
on stage indicated?), but I would have liked to have seen a little
more interaction between the dramatis personae. Deborah Polaski is
such a good artist that she can get around the vagaries of any particular
production - I saw her lend poetic dignity to one of Rosalie's
more preposterous costumes in the '98 Bayreuth Ring. I
enjoyed her performance in this production. A solemn and portentous
opening soliloquy soon gave way to blood lust without letting us forget
that Elektra is, after all, a royal princess.
Simone Young galvanised the orchestra to produce the authentic tragic
gleam.The fraught nature of Elektra and Chrysothemis' relationship
was well set forth by Polaski and Lisa Gasteen, and Reinhild Runkel
gave us a raddled, exhausted Klytemnestra, vocally well modulated
and firmly projected. Bruce Martin and Horst Hoffmann balanced the
female component of the work with obvious relish and musicality. Obviously,
rehearsal time had been well utilised; there was good interaction
between pit and stage which spoke volumes for the co-operative approach
by all members of the production team. How lucky we were to have in
Sydney such a group of singers, such an involved and committed conductor
and such a splendid orchestra. And let's spare a thought for
the thankless role of the chorus in this work whose offstage rejoicing
adds so much to the concluding section of this opera.
As I said, I'm no critic, but I do want to say how fortunate
I feel to be living in Sydney now to see the fruits of the labour
and sacrifices of so many musicians in the quality of the performances
that the Sydney Symphony Orchestra is giving us these days. Surely
our admiration for this orchestra is warranted and is not down to
the usual provincialism. One's thoughts go back to Goossens,
Dixon and Atzmon,. to Otterloo, Fremaux and Mackerras, to Stuart Challender
and now, of course, to Edo de Waart. We should all remember that performances
of the quality we witnessed here do not just drop out of the air,
but are living embodiments of a tradition that has been hard fought
for over decades. Money matters, and it always will matter, if we
are to continue to achieve work at this level of artistry.
Now, some of us were calculating afterwards where those six harps
are going to fit in the pit. Let's wait and see.
PETER NICHOLSON March 2000
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