Plain English: June 2009 Archives

The current revival of La traviata at the Royal Opera House could easily have been one of the great performances ever staged there. Richard Eyre has returned to direct his 1994 production, with its staggeringly wonderful, lavish sets by Bob Crowley (the sight of the elaborately grotesque yet beautiful décor of Flora's Act II scene 2 salon alone is worth the price of a ticket)  and magical lighting by Jean Kalman. Moreover, Alfredo is sung by the Maltese tenor, Joseph Calleja, who makes the transition from chest to head voice and back again so smoothly that there is not even a hint of gear-changing. Thomas Hampson sings Germont père at Covent Garden for the first time, and is a total wow, handsome both to look at and to hear. Violetta is a genuine diva, Renée Fleming.

Recently I've detected something curious happening in the dramatic and lyric theatre, a tendency to clarity, to narrative simplicity and straightforwardness. In a way it's the opposite of the Konzept school that has so long dominated performances in Europe, with directors of East German origin pushing their weight around the stages of the West. What we're seeing is a drive to tell the story using only - or mostly - the words provided by the playwright or librettist, to make the tale clear and lucid. 

Do all artists have a "late period," in which they exhibit power coupled with exuberance, occasionally even surpassing some of the work they made when younger? Or is this venerable fireworks display only achieved by great artists? The list is familiar (and assembling it a trivial pursuit) - Picasso, Rothko, Rembrandt, Titian, Poussin,  the Verdi of "Falstaff." On  the evidence of his latest show, my friend Howard Hodgkin, qualifies.