Read what our audiences have to say about Peter Grimes
Review by Ros McCall
The heat up in the Upper Circle generated by a packed house at ENO last night did nothing to lift the chilled bleakness of Peter Grimes' fate on the stage below. Britten's opera was a revelation in scope of composition and drama. Although I've always found his music has a unique power and sensitivity, this opera is truely a masterpiece and I think Britten would have been swept away by the quality of the orchestral playing last night . I felt proud that England could have produced a 20th century composer of such weight and as ever, the ENO team more than stepped up to the plate. The huge stage must provide a perfect blank canvas to the Designer but I've never seen it used so imaginatively, creating within three hours so many senses; the sense of actually feeling the sea wind on your hair standing on the prom, the vastness and nothingness of the ocean, the claustrophobia of the Suffolk village, the suffocating narrowness of the villages...I wanted to re-run every scene. ENO Chorus were terrifying and on the best vocal form I've heard for ages, complemented by superb soloists. A total triumph!
Review by Imogen Dent
I came to "Peter Grimes" last Thursday and am still getting over it; this, despite being not-at-all sure I liked the production itself. To me the mixture of naturalism and what I am assured was German expressionism was uneasy at best and at times downright messy; and there were moments when there was simply too much extraneous business going on, behind soloists who were giving it their all and did not deserve to have these often-silly visual distractions attempting to upstage them.
Negative comments aside, musically this was a thrilling evening; the orchestra were on fire, and said soloists were uniformly terrific. Or rather, not exactly uniformly; I don't mean that there was a weak link in the cast, since there most certainly wasn't (ENO has made something of a habit of this lately); and of the leads, Amanda Roocroft and Gerald Finley were both terrific as ever. But the astonishing Stuart Skelton towered over them, and that is no mean achievement.
I saw him here in "Jenufa" a few years ago and made a mental note that this was someone to watch; I was excited when I saw he was due to be singing Peter Grimes here; when I had to change my plans at the last minute I inconvenienced several people in order still to get to see him in action; but I had no idea just how incredibly good he would be. He has a ringingly heroic and sensuously beautiful voice; as an actor he possesses the power and subtlety to create a painfully real character and to move me to silent tears during his final scene; he even looks the part, and has the physical courage to hurl himself about (and onto) the stage as if he were made of something tougher than mere flesh. He was rivetting; I do not think I will ever hear or see a finer performance in this role. Please, please get this marvellous singer to come back as soon as possible.
Review by Jean and david Batterbee
We are self confessed Britten groupies. Grimes a favourite opera. We have seen most major U.K.productions in the past twenty years,so this new realisation was eagerly awaited.
It is difficult to remember ever hearing a Grimes better sung than it was last Saturday.The chorus were simply magnificent and the entire front line gave great depth and richness to each character. Sadly for us the production did not match the quality of the Orchestra or the singing.
The Kurt Veill echoes were so "in your face" and, for us, so discordant with the setting and sense of the work as to be frankly silly. Auntie and the Nieces seemed to have morphed in from the next door studio. We do not like the Sea Interludes played as a concert interlude. Let us celebrate that we seem to be in a golden age for singers and singing at the ENO.
Review by Caroline D'Cruz
Peter Grimes - we went last night in eager anticipation, having read the reviews, and were not disappointed - only slightly puzzled! The orchestra was sublime - much better to shut your eyes in the Sea Interludes because it's easier to imagine the salt spray and the damp air - because it's that good. Grimes (Stuart Skelton) took us on a real journey as events overtook him and there was only one way out. His farewell was poignant in the extreme. Bulstrode and Ellen Orford - wonderful characterisation and such vocal quality - the challenging Embriodery Aria floated effortlessly. But the great thing about Grimes is that it is a community - hypocritical in the extreme - passing judgment without considering it's own moral position and the members of that community were equally as good to convince the audience of their follies - without accepting any guilt. The chorus was magnificent - whether on or off stage - and the last moments, as a life continued own it's inexorable way, rose from nothing into powerful certainty.
The only question I have - and would love to know the answer to - is why Auntie was portrayed as some import from 'Cabaret' - maybe I was too far away to see it properly, but the androgynous hair, striped suit and air of Weimar decadence didn't fit and what the Boar's head, briefly appeared in Act 3 was about - I really don't know!
Having said that, it was one of the best productions I've ever seen at ENO (and that's a lot!) and my companion, who isn't a Britten fan, thoroughly enjoyed the evening, taken up in the powerful drama of the work. Congratulations to all.
Review by Julian Hopkins
In the most provocative production of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes this reviewer has ever seen, the English National Opera (ENO) succeeded in delivering a sensational interpretation of this great opera that will be the talk of the town for years to come. Inspired by a reading of the orchestral score that was at once both lyrically beautiful and emotionally shattering, under the extraordinary musical direction of the conductor Edward Gardner, the exceedingly well cast set of principals and the chorus surpassed themselves in what will probably be regarded as the ENO's finest hour (or 3 hours).
Peter Grimes was premiered to great acclaim at Sadler's Wells Theatre, London in 1945 by the company that was the ENO's predecessor. Its libretto by Montagu Slater was based on the poem by George Crabbe, The Borough, which is in fact Aldeburgh, in Suffolk. Aldeburgh was of course Benjamin Britten's home both before and after his sojourn in the United States with Peter Pears during WWII, in fact until he died in 1976. The opera has been regarded as ambiguous since it was first seen, from a psychological standpoint. The story of the hounding and alienation by the village folk of the fisherman Peter Grimes is at the heart of both the poem and the opera libretto; but the status of Britten and Pears as conscientious objectors before and during the wars years isolated them from the public in much the same way as Grimes' treatment of his apprentices does from the villagers within the Borough, suggesting that Britten might perhaps have seen himself as a victim, a kind of Grimes figure, while he composed the opera in voluntary exile in California. Grimes' character is at the heart of this ambiguity for other reasons - in the poem he is a bully, a murderer and possibly a paedophile, but Britten and Slater turned him into a somewhat more sympathetic figure, driven to suicide as much by the behaviour of the villagers as by his own actions, leaving his treatment of his apprentices open to interpretation.
Where the ENO production by the American David Alden goes to extremes is in its depiction of the villagers; they are portrayed en masse as depraved, crazed and dangerous in their unremitting rejection of Grimes and his friend Ellen Orford, the school mistress, and in their overt hostility towards them both. The production ignores the precise setting of the piece (i.e. 1810, when the poem was written), and brings it up-to-date to the end of WWII, the time of the opera's premiere. Grimes is depicted as a good man, perhaps not guilty of anything more than innocent but fatal accidents with two successive apprentices, but driven to despair, bitterness, madness and finally suicide by the hateful attitude of the villagers. Ellen Orford is initially characterised as a supportive friend of Grimes, but then she is subsumed in the manic hatred that builds up within the Borough, and she lets him go when Captain Balstrode tells him to go out to sea and sink his boat .
Britten's beautiful score is awash with references to the sea, of course, and it is incumbent on any production of Peter Grimes to embrace it; in Alden's staging the emphasis was sometimes unnecessarily on the depravity of the villagers and the claustrophobia of the locations for Peter Grimes, rather than on the sea per se, or the fishermen. However, the production prompted in the mind of this reviewer the interesting thought that the chorus of villagers, as suggested by its movements en masse around the stage choreographed by Claire Glaskin (who tragically died in a car accident just before the production's opening), was a metaphor for the savage and turbulent sea that dominates the action. The music written for the great choruses would support this. One of the benefits of this staging was that it played up the psychological aspects of the text, and that it superbly underlined the emotional power of the score.
The production costumes and designs by the German Brigitte Reiffenstuel and the American Paul Steinberg suggested the immediate post-war period quite nicely; however Alden's concept went much further in radically characterising some of the villagers as being depraved, or even perverted, in a way that actually did not fit with the period. For instance, Auntie, the landlady of 'The Boar', was depicted as a cross-dressing 'madame' in drag, complete with a club foot and cane, and the nieces were presented as autistic and driven to extreme emotional distress as they witnessed events in the Borough, with strangely synchronised choreographed movements. Mrs Sedley, the village gossip who precipitates the whole episode, was pre-occupied with her medication, and we were asked to believe that she was addicted to drugs which she obtained from the spiv-like figure of Ned Keene. The rector, the Revd Horace Adams, danced suggestively with a man at the Moot Hall dance in Act III. All of these Borough characters, and others featured in the opera, are usually played as typically parochial and English, individually harmless, quaint, but charming and perhaps only a little eccentric. In this production, they were malicious, self-serving, and downright dangerous.
The overall approach worked and was valid, in spite of the some of the extremes referred to. It was excellent theatre, making a powerful claim for the piece as the greatest English opera ever written; the score is certainly equal to anything else composed for the opera stage in the 20th century.
The singers were exemplary. The Australian tenor Stuart Skelton was as strong a Grimes as Jon Vickers, which is the best compliment that this reviewer can make. In addition, he captured the sensitivity and bewilderment that Peter Pears also characterised in the role before Vickers made it his own. His rendering of the great solos was overwhelming. The British soprano Amanda Roocroft was a sympathetic and moving Ellen Orford, and she sang the role most beautifully; some of her diction was a little sloppy, however, particularly in the higher register. Other principals who stood out were the British bass-baritone Matthew Best as Swallow, the British baritone Leigh Melrose as Ned Keene, and the Canadian baritone Gerald Finley as Captain Balstrode. The British mezzo-soprano Rebecca de Pont Davies sang well as Auntie, and Felicity Palmer gave a rounded and particularly convincing portrayal as the village gossip, Mrs Sedley.
The performance of Edward Gardner and the ENO orchestra was stunning, full of intensity and majesty. The four sea interludes, played as they should be with the tabs down, were the musical highlights of the performance.
Britten said of Peter Grimes, "This is a subject very close to my heart - the struggle of the individual against the masses. The more vicious the society, the more vicious the individual." His thoughts were honourably represented in David Alden's intelligent production. But it is the score of this wonderful masterpiece that stays in the mind.
The ENO feels that it has a unique connection with Peter Grimes due to its initial performance history at Sadler's Wells, when it was conducted by Reginald Goodall. It will no doubt be proud of the manner in which it celebrated that 'ownership' with this production, and so it should - it was magnificent.
Review by Linda Sonntag
Most fabulous Grimes ever! I just loved the way the chorus personified the sea, acting out its moods and passions. Grimes' own identification with the sea is more obvious, but to have the chorus be 'made of the same stuff' was a stroke of genius, underlining the hypocrisy of his small-town persecutors. Stunning choreography! I could see the sea unfurling on the beach (Act I), and later on, boiling and surging exactly like it does in a storm. I also loved the Nieces as vulnerable, not-quite-all-there young girls - their being exploited by the town worthies made a parallel with Grimes' maltreatment of John. Cuffing John round the ear wasn't as bad as subjecting the Nieces to sexual abuse. Also, this production made sense to me for the first time of the relationship between Grimes and Ellen, which hardly has the dynamism of a normal heterosexual love. Ellen as schoolmistress relates primarily to children and this Grimes was portrayed as little more than a child himself, totally at sea with his own violent impulses, which he could neither understand nor control. And by the way, the singing, orchestra and conducting were out of this world. Thank you!
Review by Brian E Cook
New productions of great works often evoke a strong response."Disgusting!" "Shocking!" "Marvellous!"revealatory!".My reaction to the ENO's new proction of Benjamin Britten's Peter Grimes was simply this is "Silly".
The director and designer seemed to have transferred the location from Suffolk to Grimsby; although a fairly desoltary couple of buckets of fish were all that we were given to secure us in location. They also tranferred the period to the 1940's. When in the 1940's? Presumably after the war unless Grimes was to battle with U boats as well as the waves; and, come to think of it, nobody was carrying a gas mask case.On first sight one thought that Prince Orlorfsky had sought exile from Vienna to run a pub which is like no other pub that we have seen, but no, this was Auntie!She had neices who added gloriously to the lustrous quartet "In the gutter" but appeared to have wandered in from an avant garde rendition of a Pirandello. The location appeared to be highly populated, mostly by men,in their "de mob" suits apparently, who appeared not to work. Their women folk wore natty hats that stayed on even in the gale of scene two.
Mercifully,the score, the singers, and the orchestral playing transcended this silliness. Providing, on Sat 16th May the best production of this work, musically that I have ever attended.
There were moments when the principals were maintaining their ensemble with the chorus weaving frantically around them, giving the impression that this was a concert being given at rush hour on Victoria Station.With such a group of soloists and orchestra I would settle for a concert version any day.
The late great opera director Tyrone Guthrie said that any interpretation of a work which got between the composer's intention and the audience was a total disservice.
Review by Roderick Paton
Good morning - reference current production of Peter Grimes, you ask for comments and here are some: 1 My wife and I know the opera well and have many excellent productions (eg Opera North), but would not claim to be expert musicologists. However, we read the Times and Guardian crits and are frankly mystified by their enthusiasm.
2 On the plus side, in addition to the orchestra, the singing and the acting, which were all excellent, what was good about this production was the choreography of the chorus. It added greatly to the understanding and enjoyment of a complex opera, in which one sees something new every time.
3 However, what was bad, even very bad, was: a) the stage setting, with its mysteriously oscillating roof, tatty trestle tables and corrugated cardboard walls. Far from reinforcing the power of the piece, it was for us a major distraction that bore no relation to a small fishing town or its occupants, who at one point appeared to be on the point of decapitation by the weird roof. It just looked like a cheap and irrelevant collection of bits found lying around in the scenery department. b) the character of Auntie - there seems to be a pointless, and, in this case, completely inappropriate,current trend in London for evoking Nazi Berlin (the same thing happened in Salome at ROH). Very difficult to see any relevance whatever to the Borough in England, even if you move the time from the early C19 to the 1940s. c) the characters of the nieces - I know they are tricky to define in the piece, but this schoolgirl image seemed hopelessly out of place. d) the character of Balstrode - great singer, but he lacked the moral weight of this key figure e) you could argue about the spivish Keene - we just thought it got in the way, rather than helping the story along. Helpful? - probably not, but you did ask! - Roderick Paton
Review by Courtney Kenny
I attended tha performance of Peter Grimes last night. I mthought mthatmit was horrendous - not musically, for that side was excellent (as I would expect). But the production was indescribable - alienating, vulgar, nothing to do with "Peter Grimes" - just the mad ravings of an insensitive producer. I had my doubts before I went, as I know that David Alden is, shall I say, an "alternative" producer, who always has his own "take" on operas. But last night was about the worst I have had the misfortune to attend. One must always remember that there is ar least one person in the audience who has never seen a particular work before; I took my son last night, as I wanted him to see one of the greatest English operas of the 20th century. He was bemused, to put it mildly! Neither he nor I (who have spent my life working in opera as a coach/repetiteur) could recognise any of the characters when they first appeared (Act 1, scene 1, was a perfect mess wirth so many people scattered all over the stage, that by the time one had discovered who was singing, they had stopped, and another character had taken over. At least we were spared the indignity that Glyndebourne foisted upon it's audience, by having it sung in a Suffolk accent (what Ben and Peter would have thought of that makes me shudder!) But not many of the words came across, and a lot of it could have been sung in Russian, for all we could understand! The Personenregie was extraordinary; why should Auntie be a lesbian dyke in a false fur coat? Why were the neices two school girls with dolls? Why had Captain Balstrode lost an arm? I could go on with the whole cast, but that would take far too long!
I will now have to add both the Alden brothers (my wife and I walked out of "Partenope") to the list of producers who have driven me away from their work - my list includes Graham Vick, Katie Mitchell, Deborah Warner, Richard Jones which leaves me with very few producers who's work I would willing watch. Pity the poor members of your audience who are coming to opera for the first time, and are expected to countenance such drivel!
Review by Steve Freeman
Peter Grimes. Another wasted evening. Every few years we give ENO another chance to see if it's broken its curse of pretentious, unwatchable productions. Not yet.
Peter Grimes should be an indestructable opera, but this one got carried away with the cliched trick of setting it during the time it was written, complete with lesbian sophisticate Auntie and an Apothecary who couldn't keep it in his trousers -- and I don't even want to go near the Nieces. There were a couple of good theatrical coups, like the opening, but only about a third was not distracting busy-work.
Musically, the production was pretty good, although on occasion it lacked fire. Good singing from the principles in difficult circumstances.
Review by Owain Jones
I would like to congratulate everyone involved in the production of Peter Grimes which I attended on its final performance.
Grimes is always an intense experience so I thought I was emotionally and mentally prepared. However the whole thing blew me away. Updating to the 1940s and the Expressionist sets helped emphasise the sense of alienation and claustrophobia and I found the The Boar's Head particularly effective. I always like to see how a director deals with such a vivid set of characters and was not disappointed with Alden's approach. It was so refreshing not to see Grimes himself as mentally instable, but in fact the only sane person in the Borough. The opening of Act 1 made reminded me of the madhouse scene in The Rake's Progress! I particularly liked seeing Swallow bereft of the usual Gilbert & Sullivan like pompousness, but actually a highly intimidating and unpleasant individual. Other highly successful characterisations were the spiv-like Ned Keene, the rather robotic and icy Balstrode and the obsessed, bitter Miss Marple inspired Mrs Sedley. Perhaps the most original and chilling approach was to Auntie and the Nieces Gone were the jolly, buxom wenches and replaced by a club-footed lesbian Auntie who had stepped straight out from Cabaret and acccompanied by a pair of austistic and strangely sinister Nieces. Dressing them in school uniform and giving them dolls gave Swallow and Ned Keene's lasicvious chasing of them a whole new edge. For once Peter Gries wasn't the only possible child abuser. This wholly original approach to characterisation across the board really added a new dimension to a story which asks more questions than it answers.
The singing was amazing throughout. I was sorry to miss Stuart Skelton's lauded performance, but John Daszak is born to play Grimes and managed every facet of this complex role. "Now the Great Bear" was strong and lyrical, the scene in his hut with his apprentice was wonderful, truly heart rending and some moments of genuine tenderness and the mad scene felt truly mad without being over played. Amanda Roocroft was vocally stunning and completing the trinity, Gerald Finley sang with both strength and sensitivity.
The Chorus totally occupied their role and sang with their customary vigour and intensity. I was genuinely shocked by the man hunt scene and when the Union flags came out I was reminded how easily mob rule can take over and is often hand in hand with Jingoism and prejudice. The Orchestra, controlled masterfully by Edward Gardner, played every Aldeburgh-soaked note was full of purpose and intention and their effect was so emotional they were like another character in the drama.
The whole thing was a harrowing emotional journey that forced me to ask questions about my own perceptions of guilt and innnocence, madness and sanity, the strengths and weakness of community and the knife edge that can lie between happiness and misery. At the death of the Apprentice I felt real tears in my eyes, not just at the death of this boy, but at its circumstances and its implications for Grimes.
I make no apology for waxing lyrical about this stimulating and layered production of Britten's masterpiece. I send my congratulations to everyone involved and thank them sincerely for an experience which I will not forget.
Review by Stephen Tully
Production excellent as reviews stated. This was my first experience of Peter Grimes and the director drew me into the emotional tension. Orchestra very good.
However, and this is important, but unfortunate. The main action took place well forward from the proscenium arch thus very much increasing the angle of vision from these upper seats. I consider that the director must take into acount the limitations of the venue in which he/she is working. It's different on tour. Added to this the seats in the upper circle are laid out so that you look directly at the back of the head of the person in front of you rather than over the shoulders of two people (as in most venues). All this meant that one's view of the action was greatly impaired. I was definitely not the only one noticing this as the women beside me had changed places with her husband so as to be behind a slightly shorter person!
It is about thirty years since I visited the London Coliseum and perhaps this is why. Unfortunately, notwithstanding the excellence of the production, it seems likely that I will not visit again for another thirty years. Sorry not to be more encouraging.
