Attached to the ménage of every artistic outfit these days will be an employee who believes there is a magic formula which, once found, will bring in millions of everything: fans, column inches, money. Perhaps all artists secretly believe that what we do must have universal appeal: our insights are simply too significant to be overlooked. The only reason why other people don’t come to our concerts, buy our discs, or otherwise frequent our places of high culture is that it hasn’t yet got through to them that we exist. They only have to be drawn in by the right kind of publicity and everybody will love what we do.
To find this publicity is the job of expensive professionals who spend their lives identifying the perfect image or coining the irresistible slogan. I notice that little thought is given to the possibility that the chosen image or slogan might have a counterproductive effect: that the great unwashed ignore the whole exercise no matter how thrillingly they are talked down to, while those who are already interested may rapidly go off the idea if the publicity is too trashy. Remember the cringeworthy series of advertisements that Radio Three put out when Nicholas Kenyon first took over? I wonder how many were converted to the station by the sight of a lorry driver leaning out of his cab and grinning toothily over the caption ‘Ludwig Van’. My guess is that an already small number of listeners dipped, at least for a few months. History does not relate whether they ever came back.
Such exercises aim for unlimited success: the publicity material is designed to appeal to everybody, which means going in at a populist level even though everyone knows the actual yield will never be in the millions, but at best be in the thousands. It is this mismatch between intention and experience, endlessly repeated, that is such a feature of the scene: we pay for it, we go along with the low-browedness of it, we get our few new customers, and yet think the exercise desirable, and are ready to repeat it. And the agencies know this — playing on our secret longings and implying they can manage more.
All of which makes one look again at the publicity for ENO’s just-completed production of Don Giovanni. A billboard advertising campaign depicts a used condom packet and the words: ‘Don Giovanni. Coming soon.’ In answer to the inevitable criticism from those who would have gone to see the production anyway, a spokeswoman said: ‘Given the subject of the piece, the marketing campaign for Rufus Norris’s production reflects the opera itself. We wanted an eye-catching ad to promote the opera. We came up with this idea, which we think is brilliant, funny and captures the idea of Don G in a witty way.’ To support this the company’s website describes it as ‘Mozart’s most wickedly seductive opera’ providing the plot summary: ‘This riveting romp follows the last 24 hours in the life of the legendary Lothario as he lusts his way towards one last hot date with the fires of hell.’ Which would do nicely for promoting a soon-to-be-forgotten pulp novel.
How many listeners were attracted by the condom and how many were put off? The answer is probably that neither side was greatly affected, since these days the middle class is simply too canny to fall for it. We have entered the postmodern era of advertising culture, in which no one takes anything at face value: the officials at the opera house don’t really believe in the extra millions while still making an effort in their direction; and the aficionados laugh the effort off as part of the scene. After all, the officials had to come up with some sort of advertisement for their opera and thought they would perpetrate an elaborate in-joke (with which ‘a spokeswoman’ seems mightily chuffed). The best of it is clearly that it created a bit of delicious outrage and some good publicity outside itself.
In this case the last laugh was with the critics, who disliked the production, the publicity and everything to do with this Don Giovanni. I fear the condom gave them their lead, in which there is a grave moral. Critics are not ordinary opera goers. They are paid to attend and it is their job to look for trouble. In this world the condom was a serious tactical error. If ENO was wanting to do something innovative on the stage it would have done much better to trail it with a misleadingly sober slogan. Play down in order to play up: a very British way of doing things. It would have forfeited the millions it never found — but it would have got better notices.
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