The Flying Dutchman
Jordan Shanahan and Giselle Allen in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
***
A director establishes a contract with their audience within the first few minutes of the curtain rising. In Irish National Opera’s production of Richard Wagner's The Flying Dutchman, director Rachael Hewer’s contract aims to subvert the opera’s overt sexual politics. It’s not that Hewer strays from Wagner’s source material so much as takes exception to it. An all male first act in which a young woman is bartered without her consent by her seafaring father and a prospective husband marooned during a storm providing justifiable cause. Wagner’s rampant misogyny clearly in need of a feminist revisioning for modern tastes. Yet Hewer’s revisioning throws out the passionate baby with the misogynistic bathwater whilst playing up masculine stereotypes. Even as it tries to have its cake and eat it by indulging the very Romanticism it’s trying to subvert.
Caroline Wheeler and Giselle Allen in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
A trait evident in Francis O’Connor‘s inclined, atmospheric set, with a distracting ships mast frequently obscuring sight lines. Both awash in Howard Husdon’s broody use of light and shadow evoking the romanticism of Caspar David Friedrich. Wherein an all female opening sees a child reared on fairytales shake hands with countless strong women during a stormy overture. Establishing a dichotomy between vibrant music and staid staging, between foregrounded politics and punctured passion, creating tensions which INO’s The Flying Dutchman never quite resolves.
James Creswell and Jordan Shanahan in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
Narratively, even though his music is wildly evocative, Wagner was a poor librettist, especially when it came to love. His tale of The Flying Dutchman, inspired during a sea journey from Riga, focusing on a doomed sea captain cursed to roam the oceans. Allowed to come ashore every seven years in the hope of finding a faithful maiden to love him till death do them part. As characters go, The Dutchman is dull and one dimensional, full of doomed, Byronic intensity. A brooding Heathcliff pinning on darkened oceans for a true love he dreams of but has never seen. Indeed, there’s motifs and leitmotifs, which abound beautifully in Wagner’s music, then there’s saying the same thing over and over for nearly three hours. Jordan Shanahan’s superb baritone squeezing every emotional resonance from The Dutchman’s handful of repeated phrases married to Wagner’s superb music. So lush, rich, and passionate, it became the template for Hollywood’s Golden Era.
Caroline Wheeler, Giselle Allen and Carolyn Dobbin in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
Cinema echoed in Neil O’Driscoll’s weak projections; part portraits, part poorly rendered ship at sea. Yet a synchronised moment between The Dutchman and Senta proves an unexpected delight. Unawares she’s being haggled over, soprano Giselle Allen’s romantically inclined Senta, the impressionable child from Hewer’s overture, gazes longingly at The Dutchman’s portrait, envisioned as the ideal of manliness and romantic desire. Meanwhile, she strings along the hapless Erik, tenor Toby Spence brilliant in the supporting role of a jilted boyfriend desperately in love with a woman who dreams of a man she can desperately love. Had Hewer dug a little deeper she might have better understood the hidden implications of Erik’s masculinity trapped in the belief of woman as paragons of doom or deliverance. Thankfully Spence’s impassioned singing elevates Erik’s equally romanticised conditioning into something poignant, heartfelt and recognisable. Indeed, Hewer looks far more comfortable when working with female protagonists, evident in the difference between sailors scenes and the working women. The former stiff and lifeless, the latter sparkling with effervescent movement and liveliness. The former silenced by stereotype as the latter speaks new gendered truths. Evident later on as The Dutchman and Senta reverse roles during a kitchen scene. Political gain deflating passion to a domestic drama, to the literal making of a sandwich.
Jordan Shanahan, James Creswell, Giselle Allen in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
Other problems don’t help. Stephanie Dufresne’s playful, though weak choreography suggests a compromise of convenience that’s more compromise than convenient. Even so, other elements delight. The ghost chorus far more powerful for unashamedly tapping into the opera's supernatural dimensions, something Hewer never looks comfortable with. Choral work is also impressive, as is singing despite an occasional unsteadiness in the highest register, something sure to resolve itself as the run progresses. Indeed, singing conjours the ghost of passion Hewer tries undermine, even as bass James Creswell’s Daland, along with mezzo soprano Carolyn Dobbin’s worldly Mary prove superb at earthing that passion. Grounding the opera’s emotional core, which is given full expression by Irish National Opera Orchestra under Fergus Shiel’s elegant baton. Wagner’s rising, falling, sweeping score reinforcing the dichotomy between music and staging. Hewer playing politics, Shiel’s surrendering to passion in a beautiful judged performance.
Women's chorus in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
Like Disney’s live action Snow White, Hewer’s The Flying Dutchman feels like a well intentioned revision that buckles under the weight of its self-inflicted limits. Imprisoned within Hewer’s lopsided gender reading mood get sold short for political gain, and often sold cheaply. Thankfully, as is often the case with Wagner, mind and heart lie more in his music, where he reveals permanent and impersonal truths. Even as, too often in his operas, words get in the way. Which is perhaps why one of the most powerful moments is the first wordless encounter between The Dutchman and Senta where music carries the emotional heft.
Tovy Spence and Giselle Allen in Irish National Opera’s The Flying Dutchman. Image, Patrick Redmond
If Hewer sacrifices a total vision of Wagner’s opera for a limited political message, it's feminist frame compensates by ensuring the plight of Senta is felt rather than stated. Made all the more poignant by her lack of self-awareness, highlighting the libretto as reinforcing the culturally conditioned belief that someday her prince will come. Yet Hewer neglects to realise its damaging effect for the other gender onstage, also believing their salvation lies with the opposite sex. The final drenched image of a body hoisted from the sea making clear where Hewer’s one-sided focus lies. In giving The Flying Dutchman such lopsided symbolic weight, Hewer portrays only half the picture. Reframing the action as revisionist politics she conveys half the tale. Undercutting its passion, she delivers half the intensity. Thankfully, a sterling cast sing their hearts out and sing most of the heart back into it.
Their first production of an opera by Wagner, Irish National Opera offer An Evening of Wagnerian Insight and Music at the Dean Hotel at 6,00 pm on Wednesday 26th for those wanting more. Those interested in better understanding Wagner’s music in The Flying Dutchmen should check out INO’s instagram page where conductor and INO artistic director Fergus Shiel has a number of short, insightful posts well worth listening to. Even so, despite its shortcomings, the live performance is the way to go. There are enough superb moments in The Flying Dutchman to make it an experience worth checking out. One whose music alone is worth the price of admission.
The Flying Dutchman, by Richard Wagner, libretto by Richard Wagner, first performed 1843, presented by Irish National Opera in a co-production with Garsington Opera, runs at Bord Gáis Energy Theatre until March 29.
Fore more information visits Bord Gáis Energy Theatre or Irish National Opera.
