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London
Coliseum
06/07/2000 -  10, 12,14, 17, 19, 21 June 2000
John Adams Nixon in China
David Kempster (Chou En-lai), Victoria Simmonds (Nancy T'ang), Ethna Robinson (Second Secretary), Rebecca de Pont Davies (Third Secretary), James Maddalena (Richard Nixon), Janis Kelly (Pat Nixon), Stephen Owen (Henry Kissinger), Robert Brubaker (Mao Tse-tung), Judith Howarth (Chiang Ch'ing)
Paul Daniel (conductor), Peter Sellars (director), Mark Morris (choreography)
ENO Chorus and Orchestra

Now that Nixon is more or less exorcised and even the Reagan court for which it was putatively written is the stuff of history, Nixon in China ought to be easier to take as the Verdian tragedy or melodrama which its creators -- composer John Adams, librettist Alice Goodman and director Peter Sellars -- say they intended. Certainly, Adams' music, setting heroic blank verse in English, has the some of the same dramatic bravura as Verdi's; and Goodman's development of public and personal themes in parallel, ending with the characters wearily reflecting on their lives late at night, is an inch away from Boris Gudonov. Even the dismissive characterization of Henry Kissinger a comic exaggeration of the leader's sidekick type rather than a political judgement, though it is pretty amusing as that.

But Alice Goodman's libretto, though often beautiful and well worth reading in its own right, still seems far too knowing to be just pastiche or equivalence. Kissinger's final exit is to the lavatory. More seriously, there is much sympathetic use of documentary material which if not exactly veristic cuts across the heroic treatment. Similarly, Sellars' new production for the ENO is so visually self-contained with its tasteful kitsch chinoiserie -- calligraphic trees in the background -- and equally understatedly parodied Americans that it prompts a search for irony that may or may not be there. Only Adams' music seems to guarantee the opera's emotional integrity, conveying Nixon's bumptiousness, camraderie and despair, Pat's sympathy and Chou's idealism and doubt as well as Mao's and Chiang's obnoxious self-dramatization. Yet you find yourself wondering about finding pleasure in the stuff of old news stories.

Paul Daniel and the ENO orchestra produced a very enjoyable performance of the music. The singers were more of an ensemble than the personalities involved would suggest, taking their bows together after a last act that is essentially a diffuse sextet. James Maddalena as Nixon has done the role many times before, of course, and doesn't need the prosthetic bags under his eyes to live it, amiably but with a certain shiftiness. His diction was also outstandingly good, whereas most of the other singers (with the honorable exception of the trio of secretaries) lost some words to the orchestra. Janis Kelly as Pat was a match for him, looking perfectly fifties-done-up-in-the-seventies and getting the straightforward joy of Pat's meeting with a pig and some schoolchildren, as well as her apple-pie sincerity and decent toughness. Her intervention in the ballet wasn't at all a surprise. Pat Nixon probably didn't have an Inverness accent, but it didn't do any harm. Judith Howarth was suitably unpleasant and coloratura as Chiang Ch'ing.

Paul Kempster as Chou didn't seem quite to have dug himself into the role. In particularly, his first speech (at the dinner) wasn't quite engrossing, though his final speech was wearily moving. But Maddalena's Nixon is a difficult act to precede or follow, and Kempster probably has the vocal substance and dramatic presence to make more of Chou. Stephen Owen was buffoonish, but not always audible, as Henry Kissinger, and Robert Brubaker was strangely nondescript as Mao.

The staging was visually strong if not exactly lavish -- Air Force One was a shameless cardboard cutout -- and Mark Morris' dance, mainly in the second act, was not quite camp, although the mayhem at the end of the act ("The people express their bitterness against counter-revolutionary elements") was disturbing. Altogether, this was an evening of musical entertainment and spectacle to which there was probably less than meets the eye. Which you could also say of much of Verdi.

The ENO, by the way, seems to be seeking major support for individual productions rather than institutional donors. Nixon in China is supported by a group of individual donors,and sponsored (like the rest of the summer season) by American Airlines. One of the individual donors, Bob Borzello, offered to support an American opera, which coincided with thoughts about doing Nixon anyway. The donors get what they want, and the ENO can programme as it chooses without the need to give the institutional donors what they expect.


H.E. Elsom

 

 

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