Across the pond

I was intending to write a review of Tuesday’s production in Totnes of Sweetness and Badness by the Welsh National Opera. Since my credibility as an opera reviewer is close to zero, I went in to the WNO website to look at the section where the audience post their comments on the performance, hoping to discover what the teenagers, who were watching with me, really thought about it.

To do that you have to follow a log-on process, but I must have been hitting the wrong notes on my own keyboard. I tried again and again and again. But each time I was told that I was using the wrong password or the wrong user name. And I could not even find the help button, if it exists.

So the best I can do is to tell you a bit about the opera with the help of the programme notes. It has a cast of five, all teenagers. The lead is Bobby, played by the husband of my singing niece, who ‘expresses the full range and power of a teenager’s emotions from love to hate, longing to regret’.

Enzo is the baddie, a gang leader exercising his power by brute force with the help of a knife. His moll, RaRa, is likened in the programme notes to Lady Macbeth. She certainly has the capacity to command the stage and she thrusts her pelvis under Bobby’s nose with the kind of zest which Elvis Presley could not have bettered.

Beau is a girl-next-door character who really loves Bobby but is blighted by her terror of saying the wrong thing. A bit of a wimp, as is the fifth character, CJ, who ‘is always trying to impress people’

The set is a railway line running from the front of the stage to a tunnel at the rear. The illusion of trains passing is created by the clever combination of a light flashing in the tunnel and the music.

The plot revolves around the running game, in which the teenagers run along the track in the path of the train. Somewhat reminiscent of James Dean racing his car to the cliff in Rebel without a cause.

If you like the sound of this, check out the WNO site. it may be playing at a place near you.