The Rape of Lucretia
B. Britten

Set & Costumes........Conor Murphy
Light design........Peter van Praet
Conductor...Koen Kessels, Elgar Howarth, Marc Shanahan

première: 5 May 2000, Bourla Theatre, Antwerp
company: Flanders Opera Studio, Belgium

1st revival: 15 May 2002, Antwerp
company: Flanders Opera Studio

2nd revival: 7 November 2008, Antwerp
company: de Vlaamse Opera

3rd revival: 14 January 2011,
company: Angers Nantes Opera, France

Reviews

With reference to the Nô tradition, so dear to Britten, the austerity wanted by Carlos Wagner proves itself as extremely appropriate. The use of constant rectilinear motion, structured by sublime lighting and sober costumes, constantly prolongs the audience’s reflection, isolates the issues perfectly, exalts all the violence of sometimes introvert sentiment. The often oppressive climate of the drama actually gains impact insidiously, ever more concrete, ever more penetrating. Some elements, like a weaving loom, a spindle wound with red thread, candles and a sandy bank, find a variable symbolic use, depending on the thread of the action.

Opéra magazine

Brilliant Britten
For the Rape of Lucretia, the staging of Carlos Wagner finds simplicity in a work that isn’t. He places the chorus outside of the frame of the set: blindfolded, hands tied, they know but they cannot see or act, a captivating image. The play happens far away from them… sustained by an almost too discrete direction around the Lucretia of Delphine Galou – one loves the first image, the sad drunkenness of the men around their bottles, abandoned in a sand pit, parable of the immaturity of the strong sex.

Diapason

Drama on the square millimetre
With "The Rape of Lucretia" the Flemish Opera have invited a precious gem into their house--- the Venezuelan director Carlos Wagner makes the chorus spend large part of the evening blindfolded and tied up. They comment but cannot interfere. At the end of the performance they are freed, but blindfold and tie themselves up voluntarily. The standpoint of the director about the somewhat sickly sweet religious ending --- Wagner directed this show eight years ago at the Opera Studio in Ghent. The images he created are as simple and to the point as Britten's music.

de Standaard

A spectacle of sober grandeur
The opera of flanders proposes to us a production that is exemplary in all aspects, respectful of the intimate character of the whole work, and at the same time demonstrating a certain grandeur in it's very sobriety. The staging by Carlos Wagner underlines skilfully the opposition between chorus and principals --- A great success for this beautiful spectacle that allows one to get acquainted with a lesser known work of the 20th century.

Luxemburger Wort

Flemish Opera shines on the first night.
Good, very good. Quality in every aspect. In short a perfect result that was worked out excellently in every detail. What the Flemish opera gives to its public here should also be granted to audiences in other opera houses. If something is good, it is sometimes hard to find the appropriate superlatives to describe it. It is always easier to butcher something. Our vocabulary is rich enough for that. This is how it should be; where to begin when all the elements are so appealing that they force you to look and listen? The lighting by Peter van Praet: precise, not too much and not too little, an art in itself that shows itself to its best advantage in this staging. Fitting also, the costumes by Conor Murphy. The set also designed by him underpins the drama with its rigour, a good collaboration between direction, light and design. The actors show a well balanced depth of character, creating a unique kind of theatre with their acting skills. The Vlaamse Opera shows a level of quality that easily compares with the great opera houses, pity that it was not recorded for television.

Klassiek Centraal

The latest production of the Opera Studio Flanders is a complete success.
 - a production lead under rigorously professional conditions. The mise-en-scène by Carlos Wagner, the design by Conor Murphy (both of whom we will find again in the next season of the Flanders Opera), lighting by Peter van Praet (one of the collaborators attracted by Robert Carsen). This gives an idea of the high standard of the artistic framework, with a resulting production that is poignant, justly ambitious, and in which the skilful stripping-down of the visual aspects - and the direction of the actors - gives evidence of the dramatic effectivenes. The performers seize the opportunity without ostentation, to support their song and the play of their bodies, in a slow perpetuum mobile, suspended, timeless, shocking.

La Libre Belgique

This opera is not without challenges, and the staging to which the director Carlos Wagner has brought all his know-how, is worthy of the greatest praise. At first the stripped down stage design, and the chorus that resembles two sitting statues, surprise the audience. Gradually the director builds a slow yet assured momentum for the ensemble, full of dignity and tragic tension, revealed with carefully judged lighting of occasional icy coldness. For a studio Opera, this was a production of surprising professionalism worthy of any official stage. The applause was enthusiastic and long, showing appreciation for this demonstration of great quality.                              

La Semaine

The Rape of Lucretia, Flanders Opera, Ghent
The production by experienced director Carlos Wagner provided dramatic content and visual effects of the highest order. It's not a pretty tale, and Carlos Wagner and set/ costume designer Conor Murphy have conceived a fittingly stark décor. The set consists of an austere succession of receding proscenium arches. The only splashes of colour are the crimson loom at which Lucretia and her two servants weave a Norn-like discourse, the vermillion around Tarquinius' sword and the dagger with which Lucretia kills herself. Peter van Praet's subdued lighting heightens the overall sense of menace. Don't be fooled by the Opera Studio label. This is a memorable production, not to be missed.

The Bulletin

The chorus sings - in this essencial and notable production of the Venezuelan Carlos Wagner - blindfolded, like symbols of how lost humanity is, how blindly man walks, which according to this work ( unusual for Britten) can only be explained and justified with Christ's Passion --- The staging relies on the lighting, dark tones with the occasional detail of naked white or red and white. A few details bring the myth forward (it is obvious that the pretext of roman history servers a much more abstract and timeless purpose)  as when Tarquinius smokes a cigarette in the drinking scene and after he has commited the rape. Every thing happens in a place that somehow is and isn't Rome, very Shakespearean.

mundo clasico

Carlos Wagner is definitely a director with whom one has to count from now on. With deliberately reduced means, he has in fact managed to underline all the tragic grandeur of Britten’s oeuvre, in a single set, simple and geometrical, with careful lighting and a sparse use of props, as support for a great textual intelligence and a direction of actors that is executed with care and a remarkable sense for the visual. A production that assumes its timelessness. We will not so soon forget the final vision of Lucretia crucified on her weaving loom, and her followers dissolved in tears at the foot of this improvised cross, just as the chorus starts to reflect on Christ’s death.

Res musica