Thursday, July 3, 2025

SAUL – REVIEW OF 2025 GLYNDEBOURNE FESTIVAL PRODUCTION

Reviewed by James Karas

Composing and having an opera produced in the 18th century was a complex business unless you stuck to Greek mythology. There are some fantastic stories in the Old Testament, but you could only write holy oratorios if you wanted your work produced. Things were improving at the time, but it was still risky. 

George Frideric Handel called Saul a dramatic oratorio, a stunning work based on the Book of Samuel about King Saul (Christopher Purves) and his son Jonathan. The latter had a close and dedicated friend, David. You may know very little about the first two, but you have met the statue of David many times and you know who he is: he killed the giant Philistine Goliath with his sling shot against all odds.

There is a story there but don’t call it an opera. Handel called it an Oratorio and added “or Sacred Drama.” That’s on the safe side of the law. He also called it “An Epinicion” a nice Greek word meaning “Song of Triumph” and further explained that it was about the victory over Goliath and the Philistines. Maybe you can produce this without the permission of the Bishop of London?

The Glyndebourne Festival has produced a magnificent and entertaining Saul. The opera has some stunning choral pieces and is visually fabulous and a pleasure to watch. It opens with an “epinicion” sung by the Chorus of Israelites praising the Lord and David who destroyed Goliath with a slingshot. We see a huge head of his victim on the stage which is rolled over and we witness the eye that David hit.

That is not the main story of Saul but the relationship between Saul’s son Jonathan and the low-born David is. Jonathan and David are friends who swear eternal fealty to each other, They are FRIENDS. Saul, with hair down to his buttocks, becomes jealous of the praise that David gets and decides that he hates him. Really hates him and orders Jonathan to snuff him. 

Scene from Saul at Glyndebourne Festiva. Photo: ASH

Saul has some gorgeous choruses, but we do not go to the opera to hear religious choruses. Director Barrie Koskie and his crew make sure of that with a large and splendid chorus lined up on the stage amid beautiful flower arrangements. They do more than sing. They move their hands and arms, make wild gestures and engage in physical acts that are entertaining. Saul pushes people to the floor and garners laughs. Saul is slightly deranged, and he is a comic figure who runs around the stage like a lunatic, and he is more of a clown than a king. That is how you change an oratorio into an opera or at least an entertainment.

Saul’s daughter Michal (soprano Soraya Mafi) falls in love with David, and she jumps up and down, giggling and the audience loves her. Her sister Merab (Sarah Brady) rejects David because he is not of royal blood, and she gets our contempt and no laughs.

The opera turns somber and serious in the second half leading to the glorious Dead March in the third act. It is a startling contrast that turns the oratorio into an opera as if that mattered.

Countertenor Iestyn Davies sings David with his gorgeous voice and stage presence. Tenor Linard Vrielink sings the part of Jonathan, David’s troubled friend who is ordered by his father to kill David. The plot and the biblical story of the succession to the throne and the establishment of the House of David are neatly solved: Jonathan and Saul are killed in war.

Unstinting praise must be meted out to the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and The Glyndebourne Chorus conducted by Jonathan Cohen. They have, as I said, some stunning pieces to perform and sing and they perform gorgeously. There are splendid dance routines choreographed by Otto Pichler.

Saul by any name is a grand piece of theatre and Glyndbourne brings out its best.

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Saul  by George Frideric Handel will be performed on various dates until July 24, 2025, at the Glyndebourne Festival, East Sussex, England. www.glyndebourne.com

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture, of The Greek Press

Tuesday, July 1, 2025

THE FROGS – REVIEW OF 2025 PRODUCTION AT SOUTHWARK PLAYHOUSE, LONDON

Reviewed by James Karas

When was the last time you saw a comedy by Aristophanes? He is universally accepted as the great writer of comedy in Ancient Greece but there are few productions of his plays outside of Greece. His comedies are rooted in ancient Athens with references to events current in the fifth century BCE. Understanding them requires references to footnotes and the plays are almost invariably produced in a “version” that can be made comprehensible to a modern audience. 

The version of The Frogs, which is staged at the Southwark Playhouse in London has a long history and a sterling pedigree. It was adapted and staged by Burt Shevelove in 1974 in the swimming pool of Yale University with Meryl Streep, Sigourney Weaver and Christopher Durang. They were all students at Yale at the time.

Since then, it has received numerous changes including music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim and was adapted “even more freely” by Nathan Lane. It has received numerous productions around the U.S., England, Canada and Australia most of them with short runs. It even made it to Lincoln Center where it ran for 90 performances.

Georgie Rankcom has staged a full-throated production in the tiny Southwark Playhouse in the Borough of Southwark. The skeleton of Aristophanes’ play remains but almost everything has changed from the “freely adapted” by Shevelove to the “even more freely adapted by Nathan Lane” and the songs by Sondheim have been changed as well. It’s done in the service of making the classic play funny and understandable to people who are not intimately aware of what was happening in Athens in 405 BCE, that is all of us.

Things are not going well in old Athens and Dionysus, the demigod of the theatre decides to go to Hades, the underworld, and bring a great playwright to fix things. This version is set in old Athens, but it takes place today and Dionysus has Shakespeare and Bernard Shaw as good candidates to revive the great city.

The cast of The Frogs. Photo: Pamela Raith
It sounds boring already, but it is not. Dan Buckley as Dionysus and Kevin McHale as his slave Xanthias are superb comic actors and have some very funny lines. Xanthis prefers to be considered an apprentice rather than a slave. His parents were poor and had to sell him into slavery. He recalls them bargaining with the purchaser and trying to get a better price by offering a mule to go with him. Dionysus wants to go to the underworld as a macho man, like Herakles and he goes to his half-brother Herakles (Jaquin Pedro Valdes) to get an outfit to pass as him. Fact: their daddy Zeus did their mothers and hence the relationship.

There is tomfoolery and modern references that are funny. On seeing Herakles’ beautiful house Xanthis mistakes it for Shaw’s and comments that My Fair Lady must have really paid off.

We meet the frogs and the lazy, good-for-nothing citizens of Athens who want everything to stay as it is. How about a dance routine by frogs? We get a Chorus, and they treat us to Sondheim’s songs which will keep us company throughout.

The travelers need to cross the river Styx with a hilarious Charon (Carl Patrick), the boatman. The Frogs appear and do their number, and we meet Ariadne (Alison Driver), Dionysus’ former wife. All along we are treated to energetic acting, dancing and singing.

In order to decide what poet will return to earth, they propose a contest between Shaw (Martha Pothen) and Shakespeare (Bart Lambert). In the end Shaw reads some lines from Saint Joan and Shakespeare recites lines from Cymbeline. They do not work very well because they are not in keeping with the spirit of the play. The second half fizzes out a bit and a line like “I will throw Ibsen in” when trying to convince Dionysus to take Shaw over Shakespeare is the best we get.

Director Georgie Rankcom creates energy and humour with a talented cast and a play version that we are grateful for.
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The Frogs by Aristophanes et. al. played until June 28, 2025, at the Southwark Playhouse, 77-85 Newington Causeway, London SE1 6BD. http://southwarkplayhouse.co.uk/

James Karas is the Senior Editor, Culture, of The Greek Press