Review: Peter Grimes at the ENO

Benjamin Britten's dark operatic tale

Peter Grimes
English National Opera, The Coliseum
9-30 May 2009

Stuart Skelton (Grimes); Amanda Roocroft (Ellen); Gerald Finley (Balstrode)
Edward Gardner (conductor)
David Alden (director)

ENO Orchestra and Chorus

Britten's dark tale of the fishing-village outsider driven to suicide by the mob gets a powerful performance here. There are some strange touches from director David Alden, but fine singing, blockbuster choruses, and intense musical performances make it memorable for the right reasons.

The niggles first. It's set here in 1945, when the opera was written, not a century earlier as per the score. Some of this works well. The postwar mud- and slate-coloured austerity wardrobe suits Britten's intense moods and musical buffet of cold-cuts. But the references to workhouses and carts jar. Sets are spare, effective at the end with the vast grey fen of a stage under huge dark clouds, but less so in the amateur-opera trestle tables of the Prologue and Act I.

There are too many gratuitous gimmicks. The 'nieces' – the village tarts – are dressed as schoolgirls, do weird stuff with dolls, and keep gesturing bizarrely as if directing traffic while playing hopscotch. What are they supposed to be doing? They didn't seem to have a clue themselves.

Other things irritate too. The group gestures in 'Old Joe', like a self-help group for cricket umpires with Tourette's; Grimes's evident affliction with cerebral palsy; Balstrode's missing left arm, and high voice when telling Grimes to sail to his death; Auntie's lesbian-madame suit and tie; the hopelessly anachronistic groin-kneeings in the misfiring Moot Hall dance.

No wonder the surtitlers literally lost the plot twice, blanking out for a minute or so before finding their way back.

And yet... there's plenty enough positives. Gerald Finley is an excellent voice of wisdom in Balstrode, diction clear and voice woodily authoritative as ever. Amanda Roocroft is a fine Ellen, full of naive compassion and then self-doubt, voice as sparkling as a sunlit sea.

And Stuart Skelton's barrel-torso Grimes is a winner, both bully and fantasist: the final scene, where he falls apart, was riveting and moving. He nailed it vocally too, being appropriately tense or lyrical in the top notes as required.

The orchestral interludes sounded as good as they've ever done. The whirling storm, shadowy moonlight, and misty herring-gull morning were a delight. But best of all were the choruses. They're central to Grimes, the murderous, lynch mob that still lurks in today's media-obsessed global village. And they were terrific here, particularly in the wild-eyed chants of 'Pe-ter-Griiiiimes!!!' near the end, the near-silences in between chilling the blood.

So not five-star. But still a profound, shocking experience thanks to some of the greatest English opera music every written. Well worth going to see.