Die Frau ohne Schatten: this opera was made for the Met’s unique stage
This Wernicke production at the Met, in its magical majesty, is the only one to do full credit to Strauss's masterpiece.
If the squeals of little fish flying through the air, then sizzling in a frying pan – unborn children of the watching potential mother who refuses to bear them – seem an absurdist operatic turn-off, bear with me. Don’t tune out. Just yet.
Fish are just one of many complex symbols illustrating the simple, utterly compelling story of Die Frau ohne Schatten. Cue spirit worlds, a magic falcon, an Emperor turned to stone, spells, a witchcraft lover, earthquakes, a mysterious self-steering boat on a lake – and most importantly, a bartered shadow.
But tune in to the core of the plot, and you will discover that Richard Strauss’s and Hugo von Hofmannsthal’s masterwork, Die Frau ohne Schatten, is telling us something perfectly straightforward. That in a Europe of 1919, devastated by the most destructive war in human history, compassion alone can rebuild.
When first performed in a hungry, cold Vienna on 10th October 1919 Die Frau stood as a lighthouse, shining its beam of hope across a dark landscape. That was Strauss’ and von Hofmannsthal’s purpose.
Yet, audiences were indifferent. They let the complexity of supporting symbolism get in the way of that simple story. Strauss’ other operas of the era, romantic Der Rosenkavalier and comedic Ariadne auf Naxos were more tuned to popular tastes.
Vienna lay in ruins – a wasteland. Four empires had fallen; Austria, Russia, Germany and Ottoman. Von Hofmannsthal was deep into planning with Max Reinhardt, Austrian avant garde director and filmmaker, the Salzburg Festival.
Salzburg would be a festival of the operatic arts ‘for everyone’, inspired by von Hofmannsthal’s 1911 play, Jedermann, (Everyman). An adaptation in English by American playwright, George Sterling, The Play of Everyman, debuted in 1917.
The “born again world” festival was to create a common sense of identity through art. Opera. Plug the gaping gap politics had so tragically failed to fill. The Salzburg Festival was a huge success, but hardly for “everyman”. Best laid plans and all that, as Rabbie Burns reminds us.
Into that cultural jigsaw, Die Frau slotted perfectly. So, how did we arrive at those screaming fish in a pan - and what happened next? Here’s the abbreviated story. Full synopsis here.
We find ourselves in a mythical time and place. The South Eastern Islands, Asiatic in character. Action takes place on two levels, the spirit world above and earth below. The ruler of the spirit world, Keikobad, never appears. Except musically.
Right at the opening Strauss blasts out a three-note descending Keikobad theme, bA, F, bE – quaver, semi-quaver, crotchet. The score is simple. Eight trombones, ffff and an accent on every syllable. Crash!
This opera is off to the races. Strauss is clearing the ground. Try it on a handy piano. So simple. Just like Beethoven’s four note opening to his 5th Symphony. Maybe snitched!
Keikobad, a spirit king, never appears, but is present throughout, as that descending triad weaves its way in and out of the score.
An Emperor, human, who inhabits a middle world, is on a hunting trip. Keikobad’s daughter, who has taken on half-human form and transformed herself into a white gazelle – as girlies on a night bash do – is in the forest.
The gazelle is blinded by the Emperor’s falcon, his arrow grazes the gazelle’s neck. Not a great shot, the Emperor. Considering he goes hunting every day.
Just as well. Keikobad’s daughter, no name, decides the game of adopting cheesy forms – white gazelle, I ask you – is up and emerges from the animal’s body as herself.
The Emperor of the Seven Isles grasps her, falls in love. They marry. Keikobad is furious. The Empress – now she at least has a title - loses her magic transformational powers, and her shadow. This a fairy tale illusion. No shadow, no maturity – like Peter Pan. And no ability to bear children.
Down comes a Spirit Messenger from dad to visit the Empress, but is received by her nurse. Bad news. In the next three days the Empress must acquire a shadow – become fully human – or the Emperor will be turned to stone.
Nurse and Empress descend to earth seeking a shadow in a clattery orchestral interlude, arriving in the hovel home of Barak, a Dyer and wife. Again, the wife has no name. Things are not great chez Barak. Squalor, marriage failing, wife unhappy, no kids.
Nurse spots a patsy who will sell her shadow.
Essentially, this is now an opera about the fates of parallel, contrasting couples. The Emperor and Empress, sexually active, but barren, and with a three-day Keikobad petrification order hanging over them, and Barak and a wife who denies her husband sex, both living in their own versions of marital hell.
Nurse and Empress appear to Mrs B, pay three visits, act as relations who are servants offering the entranced woman a diamond encrusted tiara, sex with a toy boy summoned from the basement, luscious food and entertainment. Mrs B is prepared to sell her shadow.
When Barak returns unexpectedly, and no meal is on the table Nurse conjures up a fire and the fish who jump into the pan, as an offstage chorus voices them as unborn children. Mrs. B listens with horror.
She is split. Spark of love for Barak. He eats the fish. She tells Barak she has been unfaithful with toyboy. Barak and his one-eyed and one-armed brothers see she has no shadow. He threatens to murder her. Hey presto. All disappear to the spirit world.
Meanwhile, the Emperor thinks the Empress unfaithful as he hasn’t found her at home. He heads to the spirit world, condemned to turn to stone.
Act III resolves the situation. Barak and his wife sing separately, distant from each other in the spirit world. She learns compassion for her husband and admits she lied about succumbing to the charms of toyboy, just to wind him up.
The Empress is transported to an isle on a magical boat where her Emperor is now encased in stone. Only his eyes remain. And, fortunately for all of us, his voice. Keikobad’s spirit tells her if she takes Barak’s wife’s shadow her Emperor will be released. Torment.
We have reached the climax of the opera. Until now the Empress has been a figure of serenity. The action has been driven by the character of her ironic nurse. But when Barak’s wife is donning the jewels, the Empress steps forward and quietly hands her a mirror.
It is the first step on a transformative journey from passive watcher to motivated actor. Eventually the Empress gains dominance, shooing nurse away on the magic boat. She will face her crisis alone.
What she has learned as a watcher of the plight of Barak et femme as the opera develops is that compassion is more powerful than satisfying her own needs.
The Empress defies her father. Come what may. As she is commanded to take the shadow, she summons all her strength and delivers a blasting. “Iche werde nicht”. “I will not”.
Keikobad rewards her by giving the Empress her own shadow. She becomes completely human. The Emperor is released from his stone tomb. The couple are joined by Barak and his wife and the opera ends with a triumphant quartet. Without a shadow of a doubt.
This opera was made for the New York Met’s unique stage. The current production, set and lighting from German genius director and designer, Herbert Wernicke premiered in 2001. Tragically, Wernicke died in 2001 at the age of 56.
Wernicke must have pitched up at the Lincoln Center, done a backstage tour of the turntable, the receding and processing stage, the NASA Shuttle high flies and the chasm of a pit, capable of swallowing an entire descending set at a moment’s notice, and rubbed his hands in glee.
He produced a spectacle the like of which I have never seen before. The Spirit World – upper - is a cube of individual mirrors, shimmering magically. It is difficult to tell where walls end and floor and ceiling meet. Light sparkles out at the audience in random stabbing beams. The effect is designed to be disconcerting, and it is.
The Emperor’s costume is all glam sequin flashing absurdity, but there is no point in holding back.
Barak’s world is eerily medieval, and not the ridiculous kitchen sink drama suburbia favoured in most contemporary productions, like Russia’s Marinsky Theatre 2012 production featuring two huge washing machines, a wife clad in sloppy jeans, a cardi and puffing endless fags, plus a clapped out Range Rover to help out with deliveries.
Incidentally, it’s worth tuning into the Marinsky production if only to see now banned Russian maestro, Valery Gergiev, conducting wildly with a toothpick. Clearly, times are tough for artists in Putin’s Russia. Baton manufacturers have been obliged to step up toothpick production to meet five-year plan targets.
Apparently, everyone else knows Gergiev conducts with a toothpick when he’s not developing a property portfolio. Came as an amusing shock to me.
This Met production cannot be replicated elsewhere. No opera house on the planet can host the production on the grounds of clear scale. That’s why the current practice of co-productions means the full force of Met staging is nowadays rarely brought to bear.
It is amazing that although this Frau has been broadcast in HD there is no recording on the Met’s excellent “On Demand” service. Any Met flunky reading, please correct.
The cast is stellar. Nurse, Ninna Stemme; Spirit Messenger, Ryan Speedo Greene; Emperor, Russell Thomas, Empress, Eliza van den Heever, Dyer’s wife, Lisa Lindstrom; Barak, Michael Volle.
Special shout-out for the Falcon Mime, Scott Weber. Most productions pay cursory attention to the Falcon, as the voice is offstage. Some have a stuffed falcon up a tree. Very unsatisfactory.
Wernicke gave us a red-feather clad, wonderfully choreographed dancer who entranced, especially during interludes where in other houses the curtain would have been shut to accommodate scene changes. At the Met the set simply transposed in a silent instant.
The music. Probably the most luscious Strauss ever wrote. The spirit world feels Baroque. The Barak world resounds to strident dissonance – think Salome, Elektra. Maestro Nezet-Seguin Yannick led the massive orchestral forces Strauss demands. Faultless, as audiences expect the Met orchestra to be.
Currently, the Met is staging back-to-back a Holiday version of Mozart’s The Magic Flute. Von Hofmannsthal drew heavily on Flute for Frau. The moral tale, the trials the principals endure at the hands of Sarastro, the final reconciliation. Except, of course for the evil Queen of the Night, who cops it.
Strauss and von Hofmannsthal were the closest of collaborators – and opposites in character. The romantic Strauss has been characterised as a tail-wagging Labrador, von Hofmannsthal as a reflective, enigmatic Siamese cat.
Their artistic partnership aspired to revive a dying world. That lesson is as apposite today. I saw my first Frau in 1978, a production of Welsh National Opera in Bristol. A chum and I hoofed it down the motorway from Glasgow. Zwei Drivers ohn Speeding Ticket. Fortunately.
I have seen many productions since. But this Wernicke production at the Met, in its magical majesty, is the only one to do full credit to the Strauss, von Hofmannsthal masterpiece of 1919.