BBC Fucks Wagner's Ring

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So last night the BBC showed Das Rheingold as the first night of a scheduled broadcast of the Ring Cycle. It's a good production too; I've never watched a staged performance, but this one is intense, great acting, beautiful sets. I settle down to watch Die Valkyrie this afternoon only to be told that because Bryn Terfel (playing Wotan) has missed this performance due to illness, the Beeb will only show Act 1 and will show the rest of the opera "soon". At the end of the first act, which is also pretty freaking intense, we're told that we can see the rest of the opera on MAY THE FUCKING SEVENTH. Cheers you useless bastards. Why is the modern BBC so grudging about showing anything that might look "elitist"? In the intervening eight weeks I'm sure they'll find plenty of schedule space for repeats of bad sitcoms and house-buying shows. Cunts.

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Monday, 28 March 2005 23:09 (twenty-one years ago)

Yup. Pissed me off. Just shows how much this whole thing is riding on Terfel. I was at last tuesday's performance where he was noticably off in act 2, then before the third act a woman came out and announced he had a throat condition, but was going to soldier on anyway. Fer crying out loud.

If anyone's interested I started this: Tolkein and Wagner

― Masked Gazza, Monday, 28 March 2005 23:16 (twenty-one years ago)

Thanks Gazza, couldn't find another thread. I assumed the reason the Beeb had copped out was that they were selling it on Terfel, although I thought he was great in Rheingold.

― Ferlin Husky (noodle vague), Monday, 28 March 2005 23:19 (twenty-one years ago)

Rheingold's staging was amazing yr right, Die Walkure was pretty noneventful in comparism. The beginning of the third act (Valkyries)
didn't quite work, nice horse skulls tho.

(Also, can I just say how unecessar a good third of Seigmund and Sieglinde's "duet" is in act 1?)

― Masked Gazza, Monday, 28 March 2005 23:20 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe the schedule is set a long time in advance, and it takes time to fit in a change?

― phil jones (interstar), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 02:41 (twenty-one years ago)

Maybe the schedule is set a long time in advance, and it takes time to fit in a change?

Ding ding ding ding.

― Xii (Xii), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 07:03 (twenty-one years ago)

Ha ha, oddly this is excellent news for me as I watched the first one and somehow got it into my head the next one was at the same time the next day. By the time I realised it was scheduled for earlier I had missed it which I assumed still the case until I read this thread.

I can see the Beeb's point about Terfel, being generally less impressed with the staging than by the singing and playing & Terfel was indeed great.

― frankiemachine, Tuesday, 29 March 2005 10:20 (twenty-one years ago)

but this one is intense, great acting, beautiful sets

This is what constitutes great acting in opera??!?!? This explains why I don't like opera, ha ha.

― Bad Day At Dadrock (Dada), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 10:25 (twenty-one years ago)

I was impressed by the opening nudity, but they failed to follow up on this bright and promising start.

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 10:56 (twenty-one years ago)

Bryn Terfel is THE MAN.

― The Ghost of Dan Perry (Dan Perry), Tuesday, 29 March 2005 13:09 (twenty-one years ago)

one month passes...

Die Valkyrie was well worth waiting for. On a completely different level from the production of Rheingold.

― frankiemachine, Wednesday, 25 May 2005 07:12 (twenty-one years ago)

BBC Fucks Wagner's Ring

Hmmmmm.

Tell me, was there a 6-foot prick involved?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/olmedia/1440000/images/_1440576_portillo_pa_150.jpg

― Stewart Osborne (Stewart Osborne), Wednesday, 25 May 2005 07:21 (twenty-one years ago)

Yeah it has to be said the production was great but the introductions by Portillo were astonishingly amateurish and banal, even based on low expectations. The comments by Germaine Greer and some grey "Wagner expert" were equally crap. All the analysis predictably an attempt to explain "what it means", the rule apparently being that any comment made had to be superficial and/or of doubtful validity. Fortunately I had it recorded and was able to skip through a lot of this nonsense.

― frankiemachine, Wednesday, 25 May 2005 07:31 (twenty-one years ago)

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