Manner vs Matter: War Horse and The Enchanted Island

[deliasherman]

Last week, in the company of a good friend from out of town and her mother, we went to Lincoln Center twice.  Once to see War Horse at the Vivian Beaumont, and once to the Metropolitan Opera for The Enchanted Island.

You'd think, wouldn't you, that the two performances couldn't have been more different.  War Horse is a play about a horse and his boy

Comments

How retrofitted?

[negothick]

So the music was by Handel et alia. . .but did someone write new lyrics? In what language? It all sounds a bit like the fannish musicals that the RISFA players did in 77-79, with Sue Anderson and Mark Keller (both of blessed memory, alas) writing parody lyrics that fit the "plot" using G& S songs--and others.

Re: How retrofitted?

[deliasherman]

Well, kind of, yes, now that you mention it. There was a new book, in English. But the lyrics weren't parodies (any more than any other opera lyric). They contained great swathes of actual Shakespeare, and more open vowels than English poetry usually sports. And a certain pervading silliness, except for Caliban's laments and Sycorax's rants. Nah. "VENGEANCE!!!!" sung over and over again, however beautifully and with whatever decoration, is still kind of funny.

[asakiyume]

Ooh, The Enchanted Opera sounds wonderful.

[wild_irises]

By odd routes, abostick59 and I know Phelim McDermott, the director of The Enchanted Island and saw one of his productions (theater, not opera) on our one night in Sydney.

Sounds very similar, in the sense that it was visually stunning, memorable, and didn't touch my soul.