"If everything is fascist then pretty much nothing is, and staging Lohengrin in such a way is merely a sign that the people in charge have given up."
I had a similar experience in attending the BNO's production of Valkyrie in the winter. They had the cast in athleisure, sang in a pretty stilted English translation, and had toned down the drama completely - as if to pre-emptively ward off claims that full Wagnerian bombast meant the BNO was sponsoring fascism. What it resulted in was five hours of me also staring at the ceiling to enjoy the music because everything else was so boring. They put Odin in a puffer jacket! It was so weird. I couldn't understand who would enjoy it.
"If everything is fascist then pretty much nothing is, and staging Lohengrin in such a way is merely a sign that the people in charge have given up."
I had a similar experience in attending the BNO's production of Valkyrie in the winter. They had the cast in athleisure, sang in a pretty stilted English translation, and had toned down the drama completely - as if to pre-emptively ward off claims that full Wagnerian bombast meant the BNO was sponsoring fascism. What it resulted in was five hours of me also staring at the ceiling to enjoy the music because everything else was so boring. They put Odin in a puffer jacket! It was so weird. I couldn't understand who would enjoy it.