Should we, as most decent citizens would, avert our eyes from the celebrity shag of the century?
Covent Garden, in its desire to avoid a repetition of the elitist mauling it got from the tabloids in the 1990s, has been cuddling up to the lowest elements in the popular press. The Sun, when it hears the word ‘culture’, reaches (like Dr Goebbels) for its gun. Both, for diverse reasons, see an advantage in a quick seasonal screw. The Sun wants to deflect the imapct of the imminent Leveson Report. The ROH needs to show it is doing all possible to reach a mass audience. The ends are admirable, but the means? Oh, dear.
Read all about it below, but it leaves this culture vulture feeling distinctly queasy.
PRESS RELEASE
7 NOVEMBER 2012
SUGAR PLUM FAIRIES, DANCING SNOWFLAKES AND A CHILD WHOSE DREAM COMES TRUE – A FAMILIAR STORY EVERY CHRISTMAS WITH THE ROYAL OPERA HOUSE AND THE SUN
This Christmas, the Royal Opera House and The Sun are once again coming together to offer readers a very special family performance of The Nutcrackerwith the Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treat, supported by The Helen Hamlyn Trust in memory of Paul Hamlyn.
Following the incredible success of the Paul Hamlyn First Nights in September 2008 and October 2009, and the Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treats in December 2010 and 2011, which offered Sun readers the chance to see performances at the Royal Opera House for a discounted price, the two organisations have come together again to offer a Christmas family treat for December 2012.
The Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treat is for people who have not, as yet, had the opportunity to attend a performance at the Royal Opera House. Readers will be able to see The Royal Ballet perform the first night of The Nutcracker from just £5 per person. There will be a series of fun activities for all ages from 4.30pm throughout the building prior to the performance.
At Christmas time, a young girl gets a present she’ll never forget – a trip to a land where everything is made of sweets. The Nutcracker is the ultimate Christmas show with a succession of Tchaikovsky’s best-known and most glorious dance tunes. The Royal Ballet’s production has been described as the ‘best Nutcracker in town’.
In the exclusive partnership with The Sun, readers will be invited to apply for Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treat tickets priced between £5 and £19.50, which means a family of four can enjoy a day out for as little as £20. A ballot will then take place and the successful readers will be notified and able to purchase their tickets for The Nutcracker. Details on how to register for tickets will be published in The Sun in the first week of November.
The Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treat is generously supported by The Helen Hamlyn Trust, in memory of the late Paul Hamlyn and is part of a wider initiative to open up the work of the Royal Opera House to new, as well as existing, audiences.
Tony Hall, Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House, says:
“To be able to welcome new audience members to the Royal Opera House and experience the excitement we feel in the building at a Paul Hamlyn performance is always special! The Nutcracker is a fantastic seasonal first ballet for all ages – a well-known story, beautiful music and the perfect start for Christmas!
We’re very grateful to the continued support of Lady Hamlyn and the Helen Hamlyn Trust who are enabling this special performance to take place at such reduced prices and to The Sun who allow us to tell the world that the Royal Opera House and the performances we stage are for absolutely everyone.”
Helen Hamlyn, dedicating the Paul Hamlyn Christmas Treat performance to her late husband, says:
“I would like to add my welcome to this years ‘first time’ family audience at the Royal Opera House for the “Paul Hamlyn Family Treat”.
“My Trust, in partnership with the Royal Opera House and with the association of The Sun newspaper, wishes to share this special performance of the much loved ballet – The Nutcracker. This event offers the magic of the Opera House at Christmas with the added excitement of activities before the performance – letting you into the “secrets” of what goes on behind the scenes. I hope you will be inspired and this will be the first of many visits to this great national institution which should be enjoyed by everyone.”
Dominic Mohan, Editor of The Sun, comments:
“The Sun’s special relationship with the Royal Opera House goes from strength to strength and we are once again delighted to offer thousands of Sun readers the chance to see this fantastic performance.
“The Royal Opera House is a truly spectacular setting for the delights of The Nutcracker and the whole family will be enthralled by its magic for what will make the perfect start to the festive season.
“Once again I would like to thank Lady Hamlyn for her generosity in making this partnership possible.”
I don’t see what’s wrong with this Norman. What don’t you like? Opera (or ballet in this case) shouldn’t be for the kind of person that reads The Sun? (whoever they are). Should this sort of offer be reserved for Times readers?
I think a lot of Sun readers probably enjoy going to a musical or a panto, and top musicals or pantos (or indeed premiership football games) cost about the same as going to the ROH. No reason why their appetites shouldn’t be broadened and perhaps see what female (and indeed male) bodies are capable of when your horizons are raised somewhat above Page 3.
I don’t see any problem whatsoever with this. Good on the Hamlyns and good on the Murdochs.
Fine – if it works.
I just have doubts about the belief that mixing two extremes gives a result somewhere in the middle – like mixing paint. I don’t think it works that way.
We’ll see.
Could you drop the Nazi comparisons once and for all? Goebbels killed people.
As for this offer, I don’t see what’s wrong. Of course, not everyone who goes to the ballet once will become a regular goer; however, it is a better way to encourage people to visit than inaction!
This article left a nasty taste in my mouth. The contempt shown for Sun readers was horrible. The class system is well and truly still alive in England I see.
The Sun is quite good at dishing it out – and not just in England.
Can”t honestly see the relationship between the horrors perpetrated by the Nazi Party and the Sun wanting to indulge in a bit of culture. Don”t you think the comparison is somewhat overdone?
When the Sun offered tickets to Don Giovanni in 2008, the Guardian published an article that took a similarly snobbish view of Sun readers being allowed into the Opera’s hallowed halls. The Sun’s response:
“Elitist broadsheet The Guardian wrote an article last week sneering at the fact that lowly Sun readers should dare to grace the Royal Opera House. Blow them. They can have a night in with their mung bean sandwiches and discuss existentialist feminism. We’ll be down the opera having a knees-up.”
The Royal Ballet won’t be changing the production in any way or talking down to its audience as the BBC is now wont to do. Instead they will be providing access to a high class production for a new audience. The idea seems admirable to me.
It was Goering, not Goebbels. Also, he didn’t actually say it, it’s from a play: http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Hermann_G%C3%B6ring#Misattributed
Actually, it was neither. The originator of the quote was a minor Nazi, Hanns Johst.
Is Katherine Jenkins going to be in it? She loves the tabloid press.