A new opera is rare on the main stage at Covent Garden (and rarely good too). The scene is set as soon as you enter. In the foyer, all the pictures and memorabilia have been replaced by Anna’s. In the auditorium, the angels behind the lights have been given Anna faces, there’s a big one above the now pink curtain and even the royal crest has changed from ER to AR!
Twenty years ago, I saw an exciting opera debut at the Edinburgh Festival by a young 30-year old based on Stephen Berkoff’s play Greek; it showed great promise. Ten years later, I saw the first and best opera of the last decade based on Sean O’Casey’s play The Silver Tassie by the same composer. It’s taken another eleven years to get Mark Anthony Turnage’s third – he’s talented, but not very productive (opera-wise)!
So it’s good to report that it was worth the wait. It lives up to the hype and may well be the best modern opera ever staged at Covent Garden (it’s a small short-list, with Thomas Ades’ The Tempest and Birtwhistle’s Gawain and Minotaur vying for the accolade). It’s a very operatic modern story and Turnage has found the perfect collaborator for the subject matter – Richard (Jerry Springer – The Opera) Thomas’ libretto is sparking, shocking and suitably satirical. He has chosen a more accessible musical theatre style for the music (with added jazz) which again suits the subject matter; there are times when the score, played by the great RO orchestra under Anthony Pappano’s direction, really shines.
The first act shows us her rise to fame and it’s irreverent, blissfully funny and brash beyond belief. There is a huge shiny suited chorus of clones who narrate her story from trailer trash waitressing to marriage to an 89-year old billionaire via lap dancing. Her family is gross, the places she works tacky and even with wealth, tastelessness reigns (design Miriam Buether!).
In the second act, the billionaire (Alan Oke – terrific) dies and we see her decline through drug and food abuse, her pay-per-view birth, her son’s death and reality TV. It actually does become sympathetic and you do see her as a victim. Her predatory lawyer becomes the baddie to end all baddies (a great performance from Gerald Finley). In a brilliant stroke, the chorus become walking cameras who follow her around everywhere.
Richard Jones is the perfect director to pull all of this together and he’s done a cracking job. Eva-Maria Westbroek is excellent as Anna, Susan Bickley (though occasionally inaudible, even from the second row of the stalls) gives a fine characterisation of her mother and Peter Hoare impersonates CNN’s Larry King brilliantly. All of the many other small roles are expertly cast.
Now they have a hit on their hands, I suspect the inevitable revival will be at higher than the musicals ticket prices applied for the premiere, which would be a shame as for once, the lower parts of the house were accessible to mere mortals – appropriate for an opera about a mere mortal……. - Gareth James
03 Apr 11
The main motivation for attending this was to be able to visit the Royal Opera House at (relatively) affordable prices. The life story of Anna Nicole Smith is of course highly familiar and so as an opera it was accessible but I was surprised by the comparatively poor quality of the theatrical experience. Mark-Anthony Turanage's score was frequently unmelodic and the libretto by Richard Thomas was clumsy and nowhere near as funny as Jerry Springer. Eva-Maria Westbroek embodied Anna Nicole well but the biggest surprise was how much of her singing was barely audible, buried by the chorus and orchestra. I know the opera purists would have heart failure but the quality of amplification means that this is almost never a problem with musicals. Alan Oke was impressive both for the clarity and quality of his performance as the geriatric billionaire husband. This was an interesting experience if not a highly satisfying one. - David Baxter
03 Mar 11
Too much Jazz in the score and
Richard Thomas snapping the audience with his phone at the calls, underlined his cheap,derivative words. Excellent work from the cast and crew.....against the odds. - coral
COOPER.jpg "Photo: Bill Cooper")
