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<b>by Benjamin Britten, directed by Neil Armfield
Canadian Opera Company, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto
April 6-19, 2001
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"<i>Budd</i> blossoms"
The Canadian Opera Company presentation of "Billy Budd" is a cause for giving thanks--thanks to COC for bringing Toronto the Canadian première of this masterpiece by Benjamin Britten; thanks to COC General Director Richard Bradshaw for finding a great production of this work to bring us; and thanks again to him for giving Canadian baritone Russell Braun the opportunity to add the title role to his repertoire, a role he has long wanted to perform and one he is sure to reprise elsewhere.
"Billy Budd" is based on Herman Melville's final work, written in 1891 and not published until 1924. It is a tale of good and evil set aboard a British warship in 1797 when Britain was at war with post-Revolutionary France and fearful of the anti-hierarchical views of republicanism and atheism France had unleashed. Billy, representing goodness, beauty and innocence, is pressed into service aboard "The Indomitable" and becomes a favourite of all the crew and of Captain Vere. To the sadistic Master-at-Arms, John Claggart, Billy represents a virtue that, should it continue to exist, would cause his own deeply cynical world-view to crumble. When Claggart accuses Billy of inciting mutiny, Billy strikes him and unintentionally kills him. Captain Vere then must make the decision whether to save Billy or condemn him to death, a decision that continues to haunt him long after the events are over. Thus, the story is not simply about good versus evil but about how to live in a world where both exist.
The libretto by E. M. Forster and Eric Crozier is one of the greatest of 20th-century opera libretti. It is not only true to Melville's novella but concentrates its imagery so that the ship becomes a "fragment of the earth" and a "floating republic" that sails through "mists" obscuring both reality and judgement. Britten's score is alive to every nuance of the libretto, and in its insistent ebb and flow conjures up the threatening, unstable world of the sea. After its première in 1951 Britten was praised for the work's variety of tonal colour, all the more remarkable in a work without female voices.
The production, helmed by Australian director Neil Armfield, is a marvel and has already won awards for its co-owners, the Welsh National Opera and Opera Australia. The production's salient feature is Brian Thomson's huge, grey, hydraulically-controlled platform mounted on a revolve. Throughout the opera it is raised, lowered, tilted back and forth, and turned, sometimes all at once, its movements so timed to the score one would think the conductor were also controlling it. Its movements and those of the 67-member cast onto and off of it are so seamlessly choreographed and so vivid that I often had to remind myself that I was not watching an actual manned ship at sea. Rather than an example of technology for its own sake, this moving platform embodies all the imagery given to the ship as an isolated, dangerous epitome of the world. Nigel Levings' lighting creates the world of mist where the ship finds itself, making the sky seem perpetually overcast with only fitful glimmering of sunlight. The costumes by Carl Friedrich Oberle are entirely in steel blue, grey and white as befits a work about moral light and darkness. The sole bit of colour is Billy Budd's red neckerchief, which Armfield gives a symbolic value not unlike Desdemona's handkerchief.
Armfield's creation of this vast world does not come at the expense of the specific. Amazingly, he draws acting from the huge cast as finely detailed as one might find in a classical repertory theatre. Unlike so many directors nowadays, he does not artificially impose an concept onto the opera, but rather his decisions serve only to further the understanding of the text and the impact of the music. He does not, for instance, play up the homoerotic subtext in the relations of the three main characters, but he does allow us to perceive it as a subtext, just as it is in the novella and in the libretto.
When one sees a cast who both sing and act flawlessly, one finally comes to see how opera can be regarded as the most elevated form of drama. Indeed, there is no weak link in the chorus or in the 18 separate singing roles. Understandably, Russell Braun is the local favourite. Unlike his jocular Figaro and Papageno, this role gives him a psychological depth to revel in. His interpretation of Billy's long meditation in the brig where he comes to reconcile the injustice of the world with the goodness he sees in it is as deeply moving as it is musically precise. American bass-baritone Jeffrey Wells with his dark, powerful voice, characterizes Claggart not unlike one would Verdi's Iago--someone who believes in a cruel god and can cripple and destroy innocence without scruple because that is what the world does. The third member of the opera's central triangle is Captain Vere, brilliantly portrayed, vocally and dramatically, by British tenor Nigel Robson. He shows us the older Vere, whose mediations open and close the opera, as a man wracked with incessant doubt, seeking vainly for absolution.
In secondary roles, David Evitts, Lester Lynch and Alain Coulombe are excellent as Vere's three commanding officers, often singing in close harmonies or in tricky fugal passages. Billy's friends make up an opposing set of three and, unlike the vocally close-knit officers, are freely individual. John Kriter, forgoing his usual comic roles, plays Red Whiskers, a timid butcher who is never comfortable with life on board. Andrew Tees brings quite a range to Donald, who first appears as the ship's clown but is deeply concerned about the tension between Billy and Claggart. William Fleck draws an unforgettable portrait of the old seaman Dansker, making his leave-taking from Billy one of the most affecting scenes in the opera. Also impressive in their roles are Benoit Boutet as Claggart's spy Squeak and David Pomeroy as a Novice and victim of Claggart's brutality.
All is under the firm control of conductor Richard Bradshaw, who shows a clear mastery of Britten's idiom. In his hands the music inexorably builds in tension like waves, climaxing in Claggard's credo, again in the magnificent battle scene and finally in the 35 isolated chords that follow Vere's fateful decision.
Seldom does one come across an opera production that is intellectually stimulating, emotionally powerful and visually spectacular. The COC's presentation of "Billy Budd" is all these. Don't miss it.
Photo: Russell Braun as Billy Budd. ©2001 Canadian Opera Company.
<b> 2001-04-16</b>
<b>Billy Budd</b>