Thankfully, a more-considered seriousness overtakes later scenes as Tannhäuser returns to the court and woos his former love Elisabeth in a song competition but then can’t control himself within the court’s moral confines.Ī penitent outcast, he goes to Rome seeking forgiveness from the pope and is refused it. The over-the-top opening scene in Venusberg was a crude cornucopia of nudity and sex in an attempt to be shocking that proved more ludicrous than lascivious. To liven things up, Judge created a “Wagner pornucopia,” to quote the headline for The Times review. Rather than create something from the ground up, the company cost-cut by obtaining an abstract, boxy, bland set from a Salzburg Festival production of a Mozart opera. The music from Tannhäuser by Richard Wagner works as a third character in this movie, same function as the other movie Amadeus (1984) by Milos Forman.Coming back to this 2008 Ian Judge production is not so easy either. Glenn Close is simply marvelous as the Swedish soprano and Niels Arestrup as Maestro Szanto is very credible in his role as the conductor. Otherwise he's portraying the role of with absolute perfection.

Erland Josephson who plays Picabia (General Director of Opera Europa) is a great actor but he doesn't do it all well with his Spanish pronunciation and pronounces Karin in with real Swedish accent. Though some of the sceneries, dramatic situations are slightly exaggerated, I still think it is well achieved attempt to recreate typical scenes of an opera production, love stories, conflicts with opera managers, strikes, problems with orchestral musicians and singers, corrupt non-environmental cooperation sponsors, Paris and Budapest cultural milieus. It covers most of the things that is evident in an opera house and productions.

La opera tannhauser review