Opera North do Peter Grimes at the Theatre Royal

23 Nov 2013: We saw Britten's Peter Grimes at Theatre Royal. Most of the opera we have ever seen has been from Opera North. This one is touring the country.

Here is the Guardian review of the same production http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/sep/15/peter-grimes-review

It is interesting how the audience are manipulated.... PG confides to the audience (and we realise he is mentally challenged), and we can also see (when PG is off stage) how gossipy and self righteous and malicious the townsfolk are. We all finish up on his side, even though we can agree with the townsfolk that he should have an adult fishing partner, not an apprentice. The whole idea of apprenticeship is to teach something. What master of an apprentice would send his youngster ahead down a 40 foot cliff in the dark, with the intention of sailing after a shoal of fish in stormy weather, without teaching him anything about fishing, and without stocking the boat with water? So, at the end, one can be a witness to a tragedy that nothing can avert.

Tosca!

9 November 2013: We went to a live broadcast of TOSCA from the Met in New York. We were joined by Lucia Indah and SiYi Wang, students of DNC's tall buildings design module. It did not disappoint - a wonderful experience, hankerchief needed most of the way through to dab tears!

It was quite nice that during the 30 min intervals, they had interviews with the singers, and scenes of the scenery crew changing the enormous set.
Of course, we can't take pictures during the performance... but it's on screen. Here is a link to the NY Times review of the production, to the Met, and to the production.
If you are going to introduce Chinese or Indonesian students to Opera, surely this is the best one to start with!

Richard III with international students

2 Nov 2013: We booked tickets for Richard III at the Nottingham Playhouse…. at the last moment we had the idea to introduce three international students (Indonesia and China) to Shakespeare!

Eating a bar snack in the Limelight bar before the production


Anticipation of the play starting (one cannot photo once it starts)



Richard III 2 Oct 13, Playhouse's photo off the website