Great Britten

The Turn of the Screw
English National Opera

L’heure espagnole; Gianni Schicchi
Royal Opera House

Each time I see Britten’s The Turn of the Screw I am more impressed by the brilliance of the music, and more irritated by the unprofitable ambiguities of the drama. The first revival at the Coliseum of David McVicar’s stunningly brilliant 2008 production of the piece intensified both these feelings. The overwhelming source of satisfaction was the staggering conducting of Sir Charles Mackerras. It is inconceivable that there should be a more complete realisation of the score, superbly played by 13 members of the ENO orchestra. It sounded more beautiful than it has ever done, sometime serenely so, sometimes wildly: the loud interlude after Miles has been playing his pseudo-Mozart sonata sounded like a new creation. The apparent tranquillity of much of the music only gave the sinister power of the rest greater intensity.

The huge gloomy sets of Tanya McCallin are just as effective, employing the whole stage but creating a trapped world, in which sliding walls, reflected figures, stealthy stage hands and supernumerary actors make you feel comprehensively unsafe. The adult female principals are the same as in 2008, and just as good, Ann Murray a comfortable Mrs Grose, Rebecca Evans now more unstable as the Governess, and having an OTT fit when things are getting on top of her. The children are a problem: Nazan Fikret first sang Flora in 2000, when she was 12, and she looks like a sulking adolescent most of the time, unlikely to be carrying a doll — she and Miles bury the doll at some length in the ‘Bells’ scene, a touch I didn’t notice before, but one suggesting casual indifference. The Miles of Charlie Manton (he alternates with another one) is, by contrast, too young-seeming, and only at moments anything more than the first soloist in the King’s Nine Lessons and Carols, so their contributions are unbelievable.