Grange Park Opera 2002 Programme

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Grange

Park

Opera

2002

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13 June - 12 July 2002 The 5th Festival at The Grange, Hampshire

Grange Park Opera Giuseppe Verdi

La Traviata Cole Porter

Anything Goes Benjamin Britten

The Turn of the Screw

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Patron’s Foreword Welcome to the fifth season of Grange Park Opera, and when you see the theatre I hope you are as excited as we are. The originally projected final finishing date was in time for the 2003 Festival with this year’s Festival taking place in a half-finished building with weather protection. It is therefore a wonderful performance by all concerned that it has been very nearly completed in between the 2001 and 2002 Festivals. The architect, engineer and builders and their sub-contractors have been exemplary performers alongside Michael Moody, who has overseen the project from Grange Park Opera’s pointof-view. Whatever we may feel about building programmes always slipping behind in this country, this achievement shows that it need not happen with the right builders. Messrs. R J Smith, a very local firm based in Whitchurch, have been

outstandingly good. I wish I had known about them before.

An equally outstanding performance has been put up by Wasfi and her fund-raisers led

by William Garrett, who I am delighted to say has joined the Board of Grange Park Opera. Notwithstanding the shock produced by the attack on the World Trade Centre in September, the fund-raising campaign has gone well. Many of you will remember that we were talking last year about needing £4 million, roughly £2.5 million for the theatre and a further £1.5 million for what we loosely called an endowment fund. The object of this is to give Grange Park Opera elbow room to enhance productions from time to time and guard against unforeseen tribulations. For example, had Foot and Mouth disease broken out locally last year we would have suffered a major tribulation. It is very exciting that I can report that donations and promises now stand at £3.2 million. This means that we can be confident that the target is now within reach and. if a little more than £4 million is available, so much the better.

Substantially the whole of this £3.2 million has been raised from private individuals with just a single corporate contribution. Your support has been phenomenal.

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All the donors are listed on the next page but I would like to restrict myself in this foreword to mentioning only one person, our leading supporter Donald Kahn. His generosity is beyond praise and his gift of ÂŁ500,000 leaves us all indebted to him and his family, and deeply admiring of such outstanding artistic patronage.

You will all be aware that Wasfi received the obe in the New Year’s honours for her services to music, which has given all of us who are involved with her enormous pleasure. There can be no doubt that the imaginative way in which Pimlico Opera under her direction has taken music into prisons for eleven seasons was a major factor in getting her this honour. Many of you who actually attended performances of West Side Story in Winchester Prison last winter will have seen for yourselves what pleasure it gives people in prison to be able to participate in musical theatrical productions. It is our hope it may also have given you some little insight into one aspect of the crucial debate on crime and punishment in this country.

After four successful seasons I am looking forward to this year’s productions enormously and, judging from the ticket sales, so are you. Taking into account the extra 140 seats per performance which now have to be filled, your response is a wonderful vote of confidence in the expansion.

While not wishing to be eccentric about the dilapidated state of the buildings, we have all been very conscious of the fact that, while musical excellence is the sine qua non of such a Festival, the atmosphere of the place is also important, as is its location in a beautiful landscape. It has therefore been a deliberate choice to leave as much of the architectural dilapidation as was practical and not to end up with a patent leather finish. I very much hope we have got the balance about right and that we still have a country house festival, albeit a larger and financially more supportable one.

ashburton

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DONORS TO THE

GRANGE PARK OPERA APPEAL Donald Kahn and family Lydia & Miles d’Arcy–Irvine The Carphone Warehouse The Clore Duffield Foundation The Linbury Trust the strategoi • generals commanded the armed forces and appointed the Trierarchs

Anonymous James Cave Corus Sir David & Lady Davies EFG Private Bank William Garrett David & Amanda Leathers

the trierarchs • sea captains As a matter of public duty, an Athenian citizen of high property rating and with children born in wedlock would serve for a year as a trierarch, kitting out the trireme at his own expense and paying for wages and food for his 170 oarsmen. In return he could claim exemption from income tax.

Mark Andrews Mr & Dr J Beechey David & Elizabeth Challen William F Charnley Mr & Mrs Peter Dicks Simon Freakley Philip Gwyn Mr & Mrs Ian Jay James & Beatrice Lupton

Donald & Jill Mackenzie Nigel McNair Scott The P F Charitable Trust Simon & Virginia Robertson The Hon & Mrs Richard Sharp Richard & Cynthia Thompson Anne Veeder The Band Trust

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the epibatai • bodyguards This elite force enforced discipline on board and prevented desertion amongst the oarsmen. They were deployed in action only if, after the ram, the ship was unable to back off quickly enough.

Mr & Mrs Gerald Acher Mr & Mrs David Anderson Mr & Mrs R Atkinson-Willes Anonymous Tom & Gay Bartlam Rupert Thomas Bentley Sarah & Tony Bolton Mr & Mrs Tony Bugg Sir Euan Calthorpe BT Bernard Cayser Charitable Trust Sir Peter & Lady Cazalet Mr & Mrs Bernard Cazenove Susie Lintott & Louisa Church Pam Clarke Alistair Collett Oliver & Cynthia Colman Michael Cuthbert Mr & Mrs Lionel de Rothschild Anonymous Alun & Bridget Evans Mr & Mrs James fforde Mr & Mrs T Floyd Hamish & Sophie Forsyth Mr Mark N Franks David Gilgrist & Bobbie du Bois Enrique Biel Gleeson Lady Shauna Gosling Mr & Mrs George Goulding Nigel & Diana Grimwood William Gronow Davis Mr & Mrs Charles Haddon-Cave qc Hayden Trust Mr & Mrs R A Henley Malcolm Herring Mr & Mrs John Hewett

John & Catherine Hickman Dr Jonathan Holliday & Dr Gwen Lewis George & Janette Hollingbery Anonymous N O & I S Hunter Mr & Mrs David Hunter Mr & Mrs M J Isaac Mr & Mrs David Jervis Mr & Mrs J Jervoise Neil & Elizabeth Johnson Andrew & Caroline Joy Dr R Hubert Laeng-Danner T Landon Barbara Yu Larsson Peter Leaver & Thomas Sharpe Mr & Mrs Adam Lee Mr & Mrs Malcolm Le May Jeremy Gardner Lewis Joe & Minnie MacHale Mr & Mrs Michael MacKenzie Tessa & John Manser J P Marland Charitable Trust Wendy & Michael Max Anonymous Mr & Mrs Peter May Martin & Caroline Moore Elizabeth Morison Dr & Mrs Julian Muir Mr & Mrs Jay A Nawrocki The O’Hea family Sue & Peter Paice Mark & Rachel Pearson Sir David & Lady Plastow Jan & Michael Potter

footnote Our £4m Appeal has likened donors to the heroes of the Athenian trireme. The mise en scène is this: round 480bc, in anticipation of a second Persian invasion, Athens built a fleet of 200 triremes whose design was dictated by a new military strategy:

Bruce & Lizzie Powell Mark & Veronica Powell Benjamin Pritchett-Brown Mr & Mrs Christopher Reeves Anonymous Ros & Ken Rokison Mrs Faanya Rose Mr & Mrs Antony Rowe Rufford Foundation Mr & Mrs John Salkeld Mr & Mrs Anthony Salz Christopher & Anne Saul Mr & Mrs Richard Scopes Mr & Mrs Roderick Selkirk Mrs Christopher Sheridan Lord & Lady Simon of Highbury Paul & Rita Skinner Mr & Mrs Martin St Quinton John & Lesley Stuttard Mr & Mrs R H Sutton Mrs Timothy Syder Mr & Mrs Bernard Taylor Mr I H P & Mrs S P Thorburn Mr & Mrs Anthony Townsend Wendy & John Trueman Adair Turner & Orna Ni-Chionna The Hon Lucy & Michael Vaughan Lady Jane Wallop John & Carol Wates Miss Clare Williams Mark & Jane Williams Mr & Mrs C H R Wunderly Caroline Wyld

whereas triremes had been used to ferry soldiers for combat, the new trireme carried only a handful and instead would rely on its 170 oarsmen to smash with the greatest possible force their trireme’s prow into the side of the enemy’s vessel.

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Bigger, better – and we’ve kept that crumbling feeling It has been the most eventful year yet in the short history of our little opera company. We have our new theatre, not quite finished but at a much more advanced stage than we could ever have imagined. We have made good progress with our fund raising. And we have our biggest festival yet with bigger sets, bigger orchestras and twice as many performers on stage as we had last year – including for the first time at The Grange – dancers.

For us, watching it grow out of the enormous pit which first had to be dug deep into the chalk bedrock, the new theatre has been something of a miracle. We had pored over the plans, seen artists’ impressions and viewed it in our mind’s eye – but nothing prepared us for the reality. What has emerged is larger, more comfortable and, we think, very elegant. It is a real purpose–built theatre which will enable us to put on better operas. I promise you (and Lord Ashburton has made the same promise a few pages back), that it will not change the atmosphere and ambience of the festival – crumbling ceiling and all.

Back in May, life at Grange Park Opera was alarming. There were the normal explosions leading up to the opening of our three operas, already in residence in the smartest rehearsal rooms in London, the Jerwood Space. Operas always come with dramas.

But what was troubling was the thought of those operas arriving in Hampshire two weeks later, at a theatre that was part–concept, part–reality. If you stood on the stage and looked up you saw lighting bars – but no lights. To the right was a magnificent scenery dock – with only half a roof. The auditorium with its horse–shoe shaped balcony looked immaculate – except there were no seats in it.

It has been a race, but we’ve made it - just about.

The new theatre can now accommodate 500 operagoers, as opposed to the original 360. We thought it would be nice to have some animal life in the theatre to greet you, and we plumped for live goldfish, two stuffed mountain hares and some stuffed birds. They complement the displays of glassware and crockery which were dug up during the excavations and which give us a glimpse of how the Henley’s used to dine in

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the 18th century. More of that later. French artist Olivier Ferrer painted some of these objects for the cover of the programme and I have scattered them liberally throughout it because I loved them so much.

The theatre would not have been built at all but for Michael Moody who lived in his office in the Grange through the darkest days of the winter when the place was a sea of mud. He and I had conceived the idea for Grange Park Opera six years ago, with the hope that we might one day build a theatre here.

How many people dream of building a theatre and ever get the opportunity? Michael and I both regard it as an extraordinary privilege to be doing what we do and it is thanks to your support that we have been able to fulfill it.

Our donors include some very remarkable and inspiring people. Two such inspirations have sadly died since the last festival: Irina Bromley and Michael Hoare. I adored them both and I wanted to remember them particularly at this time of year.

This year’s cocktail of operas

will, we hope, satisfy all tastes and thirsts. Sponsored by the Carphone Warehouse, the first on the menu is a Screwdriver (The Turn of the Screw). There is a White Lady (La Traviata) supported by Christopher and Valda Ondaatje whose gifts are always given with so light a touch, they might be ghosts. And the Vodka Martini, shaken not stirred, is our first musical, Anything Goes.

Anything Goes is a masterpiece of the 20th century hummed on many an inebriated evening around the

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parlour pianoforte. Georges Christie and Magan expressed impish delight at the prospect of this bold departure from respectable opera repertoire and demonstrated in full voice a familiarity with every last lyric. What intrigued me about the piece, besides Porter’s staggeringly clever lyrics, were John McGlinn’s reconstructions of the original orchestration, remarkable for silky string writing – no longer heard in the musical theatre because microphones and amplification create audio “effects” more cheaply than human beings. There are probably only a handful of people in the audience tonight who have heard such a musical presented with its true sound world. I spent an enormously fruitful week burrowing deep in the vaults of the Library of Congress in Washington where I copied some 3,500 sheets of the original orchestration. Some of the songs were performed in rehearsal for the original production and, for one reason or another, cut. So this is, in a sense, a première.

Anything Goes is supported by John Studzinski’s trust, making its début at Grange Park. John visited the festival last year and thankfully enjoyed it. I hope that he will again – many times.

GPO works because it is a team effort. A central member of the home team is our Finance Director Carol Butler, keeping account of the operatic quavers and semi-quavers. The away team in Hampshire is led by Judith Becher and Rachel Pearson who disrupt their family life and their respective rural idylls, to

apply their substantial energies to the appeal and the success of the operation.

Others have contributed in all sorts of unpredictable ways. For instance it was our board member Simon Freakley, a mere accountant by background, who came up with the inspiration of putting boxes on the upper tier and projecting the front two or three rows of the stalls beyond the envelope of the old theatre.

It proved a significant improvement to the design.

The board, brilliantly led by Sir David Davies, has, as always, been tirelessly supportive and encouraging and always here when needed. I offer all of them my most sincere thanks.

The contribution of John and Sally Ashburton is the biggest single factor in making Grange Park Opera, and this new theatre, a reality. They are wise, creative, hospitable, jolly, calm, supportive, and uncomplaining – yes all of those qualities. They and their family have patiently allowed their tranquillity to be trespassed upon by endless trucks and diggers for the past year. I hope they are proud of the new theatre in their back garden.

Please drink a toast to them in the interval and to everyone from the the plasterers, joiners, electricians and other skilled craftsmen to the architects, engineers and donors (them especially!) who have made this all come about.

Wasfi Kani

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A plan is hatched . . .

I t was during the second festival at Grange Park in the summer of 1999 that John Barnes, Head of Special Projects at English Heritage, visited the site to advise on how best to take forward a plan to expand the theatre. He explained that any proposal would have to be considered by English Heritage in

2001

2000 THE BUILDING PROJECT

JAN

FEB

MAR

APR

MAY

Design development begins with the engineer, architect and English Heritage

JUN

JUL

AUG

SEP

OCT

NOV

DEC

JAN

FEB

MAR

Grange Park Opera revises the scheme R J Smith Michael and Wasfi visit Martin Smith and David Sloan in Whitchurch to discuss rendering of Smirke façade

English Heritage rejects first proposal English Heritage approves revised scheme

THE THEATRE

THE SCENERY DOCK

IC

D

Touring Eugene Onegin

Winchester Prison The Threepenny Opera

2001

2000

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Schedule Monument Consent

Launch of £4m Appeal; submission of Planning Application to Winchester City Council

Third festival The Mikado (7 performances) Eugene Onegin (6 performances) Rinaldo (6 performances) cost of operas £500,000 Donations from 400 Notable Greeks £100,000

THE OPERA COMPANY

APR

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the context of a Conservation Plan which would attach significance to the various building periods in evidence. By November 1999 the Conservation Plan was well under way and Wasfi and Michael met up with its author, John Redmill, and the architect David Lloyd-Jones to discuss the possible ways of expanding

the theatre. It would require a major fund-raising exercise, as well as numerous permissions from a variety of interested bodies, but the plan has progressed rapidly from that point (see below) and is now close to completion.

2002 MAY

JUN

JUL

AUG

SEP

Planning Permission granted

OCT

NOV

DEC

JAN

CONCRETE SLABS

2003 FEB

MAR

APR

WALLS OF STAGE BLOCK

STEEL FOR NORTH WALL

MAY

JUN

JUL

AUG

SEP

OCT

NOV

DEC

RENDERING

STEEL FOR STAIRCASES

STEEL FOR BALCONY JOINERS ELECTRICIANS PLASTERERS

Work starts on site with excavation and breaking out the north wall

ROOF

STAGE FIT OUT

THE RESTAURANT

THE CHAMPAGNE BAR

Fourth festival Cosi fan tutte (8 performances) I Capuleti e I Montecchi (7 performances) Fortunio (5 performances) cost of operas £500,000 Donations from 600 Notable Greeks £120,000

Fifth festival La Traviata (8 performances) Anything Goes (8 performances) The Turn of the Screw (4 performances) cost of operas £660,000 Donations from 800 Notable Greeks £160,000

Touring Cosi fan tutte

Winchester Prison West Side Story

Touring La Traviata

2003

2002

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A Smirke on the face of The Grange As the tents were struck and the performers, orchestra and audience made their final exits at the end of the last year’s opera festival, so Martin Smith and his builders moved in. Within days, the stage had been demolished, the inside of the theatre stripped and the site sealed off. Now the serious work began.

The plans for the new building required turning the whole audience at right angles, creating a huge opening in the north wall (the right-hand wall of the old theatre facing the stage) and burying the orchestra pit and stage up to eight metres below the existing ground level. At Glyndebourne, the Christies had the luxury of being able to go both up and down, letting their new fly tower rise high into the air. At the Grange, that was impossible. The buildings and landscape are strictly listed and it was clear from the start that permission would only be obtained by preserving what was already there, and disturbing September 2001 The north wall of the theatre has been knocked out and a giant crane moves into place a piece of the “goalpost”

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the existing idyllic scene as little as possible. That essentially meant putting much of the new building underground, while ensuring that essential new structures should be concealed behind walls which were to be an exact replica of Smirke’s 19th century facades demolished in the 1970s.

The most delicate part of the work was knocking out the north wall, built of late 19th (with patches of 20th) century brick, without toppling the whole fragile edifice of the theatre. The plan for doing this was complicated, requiring the installation of a reinforced concrete beam and columns to support the roof and new opening. It was programmed to take a minimum of 16 weeks. Martin, experienced as he was in working on delicate listed structures, came up with a simpler concept: he would create a temporary steel system within the theatre to support the roof through the parts of the ceiling that were missing (mainly where the old ceiling glass panels used to be), thus taking the load off the north wall, which could then be safely removed. A “goalpost system” of steel columns and a beam would be inserted into the new north wall opening, and the old theatre roof and walls connected to it. With the roof now properly supported on the new beam, the temporary steel structure could then be taken away.

It was an ingenious proposal, the first of many innovative suggestions and plans which Martin came up with. First however it required beginning the great underground hole which would occupy Gerald and his giant excavator for weeks. Once the foundations of the old building had been exposed, concrete footings to support the steel were constructed. The original theatre floor, an old concrete slab thrown over the under croft, had to be propped up from below in order to support the props for the roof, and the wall then taken down brick by careful brick. The whole job took just four weeks, and not one piece of the old plaster ceiling was dislodged. It cut three months off the building schedule and suddenly raised the prospect that the 2002 festival might actually be staged in the new theatre, a year ahead of schedule.

It was also the beginning of an excellent relation-

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ship with Martin and his team. Michael Moody and Wasfi had met him and his foreman David Sloan for the first time in early March 2001, and it was immediately clear to them that these were the people to build their new theatre. Martin has made a life study of historic houses, and his library on old Hampshire buildings alone runs to 3,000 books. Few people knew more about the history of the Grange, and no builder would work to restore it more lovingly than Martin would. He even called his new son, born as the work on the Grange began, William, after William Wilkins (Wasfi wanted him to go the whole hog and call him William Wilkins Smith, but he drew the line).

Visitors to the site in September arrived to find the entire north wall gone, the roof propped, and the little theatre looking naked and exposed to the elements for the first time in 100 years. It was not a time for the fainthearted. Michael moved his office into the Grange, where every day new decisions were demanded of him. With the north wall removed and the roof safely held in place, the digging started in earnest. Truck after truck of “spoil” (first the old basements, later chalk) was mined and the hole soon spread towards the house to hollow out space for the scenery dock and the underground passage which now links the theatre with the dressing rooms in the cellars of the main house. And truck after truck of ready mixed concrete began arriving, turning the site into a quagmire at the height of the winter rains.

As the digger crept towards the house, excitement among the archaeologists mounted. There had been centuries of building on this site, some recorded, some not. There are historic drawings in the Ashmolean Library in Oxford of a Robert Adam pavilion and October 2001 Gerald’s digger inside the theatre begins to nibble at the old concrete floor, the beginning of the excavations for the labyrinth (page 16)

December 2001 The stalls (and labyrinth below) are complete. The concrete slab of orchestra pit is being laid.

stable block which seemed to have been designed for this particular spot, but no one knew whether they were ever actually built. Samwell’s 17th century redbrick house, the first known building on the site, clearly sat in an established garden and may have had a back extension on this bit of the site – but no one knew if it definitely did.

The 19th century works carried out by Smirke had swept everything away, mercilessly destroying most of the evidence of earlier times. In 1817 Smirke had cut deep into the hillside, creating a terrace over three metres high covering basements and cellars built onto the original bedrock, covering everything that was there before. In 1974, when Smirke in turn was knocked down, the rubble of his grand but decaying facades was pushed into the voids and basement and the area levelled. But some of the 17th century work had been too deep underground even for the 19th century builders to bother with and bits here and there had survived. There were areas of cellaring, one near the main house, (probably a wine cellar) and the other on the north-west corner of the conservatory which did not feature on any known plans but which was probably the coal-hole.

But there was something else too: at the very lowest level, beneath even the Samwell building, the digger revealed first one, and then two more, large brick-lined pits dating from the 1660s. They were probably part of the original water system, either

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fresh-water cisterns or drainage. At some stage, probably around the middle of the 18th century, they were used for less noble purposes: waste disposal. One of them at least was used to dump the unwanted rubbish from the main Michael Moody house. It was this pit (Pit context 24 to the archaeologists) which produced by far the most interesting archaeological finds: glasses, bottles, old crockery and a large quantity of oyster shells, which are in the display cases today. They almost all date from the same short period, 1740–1760, and probably represent the dumping of broken household goods which had accumulated over a period. It is interesting to speculate that someone at the Grange was drinking out of these glasses before Mozart was alive.

While the excavation was going on, work inside the auditorium was speeding up. The brickies built the elaborate walls of the labyrinth cooling system (page 14), and the stalls were laid out on top of them.

Down in Littlehampton the balcony was being David Sloan, Site Manager welded together in sections of steel so huge that they had to be cut up again to pass along the narrow lanes and be borne up into the theatre.

Corus had very generously agreed to donate the steel, and the goalposts alone swallowed up 10 tonnes of it, while the balcony took another 30 tonnes. The balcony sections had to be put in place and welded back together before the new structure outside could begin to rise, but this allowed work to start early on the boxes, which

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needed to be ready well before the new season.

Some of the most skilled work went into creating the horseshoe-shaped auditorium, based on William Wilkins’ own design for the Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds. The curve and belly-shape of the balcony posed a special problem for the plasterers, but Les Lambell, the master joiner, worked out the ideal shape in wood, covered it in expanded metal, and then Terry Ede, the master plasterer, finished it by eye. At one stage, in the interests of speeding things up, it was suggested that he left the curve without its final skim. Terry was horrified. “Everyone who comes in here will just say: What a crap plasterer.” He completed the task to his own exacting standards.

The “jib”, or secret, doors in the upper circle are another of Martin’s little touches. Michael wanted them to be indistinguishable from the walls of the boxes, particularly from below, and Martin rose to the challenge. He found a pattern for 1850s hinges in a book in his library and had them copied. The result is that the opening doors are lost in the curved walls.

Les and his joiners came up with an addition to the foyer: the use of different width floor boards, and they experimented with half-sanded timber. Liz Kramers, who had visited the site regularly through the work, began to create designs in paint on the stairs. Above the lower boxes, 800 fibre optic lights were planted in the ceiling to create the effect of a starry night (including the major constellations), the exact positions marked in chalk by stage designer/director David Fielding (Turn of the Screw). The seats were refurbished in Yorkshire by Mr Owen and, in Kahn Market, New Delhi, Yogesh Anand made the new seat numbers with his customary efficiency. Michael, who oversaw the whole building programme, took responsibility for the technical fit-out.

As the 2002 festival opens, the theatre is probably 90% complete on the inside. Next year there will be some elegant refinements: mirrors, chandeliers and an old wooden helical staircase leading to the upper boxes. But there is another four months of rendering and plastering still to be completed on the outside walls. The excavations of the old cellars turned up an intact piece of the 1829 Smirke wall which Martin and his team have used to create exact copies of the original. The plasterers, using traditional “running horse” moulds, are recreating the elaborate cornices and

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mouldings, using the same materials and finishes to emulate the original “Parker’s” Roman cement render which William Wilkins used for the Greek revival conversion of the Grange circa 1804.

The new stage block will have a “green” roof planted with sus- April 2002 An Indian parcel with a cotton handtainable grasses, shrubs and plants. stiched cover and sealing wax arrives containing The lower levels of the north and the new seat numbers, made in Delhi west walls of the stage block will be finished in traditional knapped chalk flint, and handmade Hampshire red brick dressing with natural oak boarding above and up to the eaves. The result will mean the new theatre will merge seamlessly into the old, and the Grange building will regain its much-missed Smirke façade.

It is only when one steps inside the theatre that the scale, skill and the sheer imagination of the achievement are apparent. The floor of the orchestra pit, below the stage, is some 30 feet below the original ground level. Some 200 tonnes of concrete and 140 tonnes of steel have been poured into the building. At times through the winter and spring, over 100 workmen, including several prisoners and some excellent craftsmen, have worked long hours. The dream that Wasfi and Michael first told John and Sally Ashburton about four years ago has become a reality. It has come in on budget, it has come in ahead of schedule and it has come in as a very special addition to the arts scene, not just for Hampshire, but for the country as a whole.

Ivan Fallon

March 2002 Visitors in the balcony peer down into the orchestra pit. The steel frame of the stage area has been erected and there is a roof but no walls

ARCHITECTS Studio E David Lloyd Jones Alan Addison, Akira Koyama CONSERVATION ARCHITECT John Redmill STRUCTURAL ENGINEERS Ove Arup Charles Wlker Steve Peet, Kate Horsfall CONSTRUCTION CONSULTANT Stuart McGee PRINCIPAL CONTRACTOR R J Smith & Co Martin Smith David Sloan STRUCTURAL STEELWORK Littlehampton Welding Bill Tustin ELECTRICAL ENGINEERS R S Birch Mark Crame STAGE LIGHTING & FLYING SYSTEM Stage Electrics Nick Ewins ROOF VENTILATION Colt Group PLANNING CONSULTANT Nathaniel Lichfield & Partners Iain Rhind ARCHAEOLOGICAL CONSULTANT Christopher Currie ACOUSTIC CONSULTANT Colin Beak PLANNING SUPERVISOR WPS Group plc John Zownir

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The Treasure Trove at the Grange Drinking is in reality an occupation which employs a considerable portion of the time of many people; and to conduct it in the most rational and agreeable manner is one of the great arts of living.

James Boswell Journals 1775 Smirke either didn’t know or didn’t care much what treasures he buried under the wing he added to the Grange in 1819. The excavation for the new scenery dock, like Schliemann at Troy, dug through Smirke, on down through Wilkins (1804) into three brick–lined pits (1660) which had probably been built as water cisterns. And it was here we found our treasures: not gold or even silver, but wine–glasses, bottles, china, earthenware and a large pile of oyster shells, a concentrated little hoard, all dating from the same period (1720–1760), all clearly from the same fine household collection.

There was not much of it and there was almost nothing intact. But there was enough to give us a fascinating little sidelight into the history of this great house.

The mid–18th century was a particularly interesting period in the development of both wine–glasses (and all the glasses we found were fine wineglasses) as well as glass bottles in England. The earliest English glasses were either imported or copied Venetian glass, and it was only with the introduction of glass–of–lead by George Ravenscroft in 1674 that glasses of a purely English origin can be dated. By 1745, when our glasses

were probably being made, England was at war again and a duty was levied on glass to help pay for it. It had a major influence on the design of drinking glasses: they became lighter and smaller as manufactures tried to keep their costs down.

The feet of glasses also underwent a major change between 1740 and 1750. The folded foot, one of which we found at the Grange, was seldom made after that period, and a plain type took its place. After about 1770 the pontil mark beneath the base was ground flat, so there was no longer a necessity for the foot to be domed. We found some splendidly domed feet, the pontil roughly broken off by the glassmaker, helping the archaeologists to be even more precise in their dating.

We also found some beautiful air–twist stems, a form of decoration added from the middle of the 18th century to the lighter, smaller, plain–bowled glasses of the time. An imprisoned air bubble was skilfully manipulated by the glassblower into a series of delicate silvery spirals. There were several wonderful examples in the pit under the old wing.

In all we found nine glasses and seven fine china plates, none of them intact but with most of the pieces present.

Just as interesting as the glasses were the bottles.

Varying in capacity, these bottles illustrate in chronological order the basic forms as they evolved from the first to the last decades of the 18th century.

From the A C Hubbard, Jr. Collection

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The shape of bottles changed completely in the 18th century, starting as a squat, broad, elegant shape which could be brought to the table, to a much more functional straight–sided shape which could be racked in cellars – but which was usually decanted into delicate glass decanters whose use grew significantly in this period. The bottles found at the Grange were mostly the dumpy kind, hand–blown in dark green glass, with high–kicks and string rims. Only one unbroken bottle was recovered: a fine brandy bottle which we have included in the choice items on the cover.

There were a few less interesting items in the pit we can gloss over: bones from cows, pig and sheep and the inevitable chamber pots. But the archaeologist, Chris Currie, became very interested in the Chinese porcelain plates and teawares of blue and white patterns, with gilded edges on some of the plates.

“Overall the assemblage tended to be a high status collection,” he concluded.

How and why had it all got there? We had to conclude that around 1750 someone (maybe Robert Henley – or his wife – who inherited the house in 1748) had decided on a major clear–out in the great house and had thrown out all the broken material which had accumulated over the years.

Thank goodness they did.

A luncheon of oysters

by Jean-François de Troy (1679–1752) Musée Condé, Chantilly

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Under the audience ~ Labyrinthine Comfort

by David Lloyd Jones

H idden beneath the stalls of the new auditorium is a labyrinth. It has an important function: keeping the audience cool on hot summer evenings.

It has come about by a happy conjunction of past and present events. The opera house at the Grange started life as a conservatory or orangery constructed with an arched brick undercroft which accommodated pipework for irrigation and humidification, providing warm air for the exotic fruit that once grew here in profusion.

When it came to designing the new auditorium, we decided the stage and the pit had to be dug down into the ground in order to keep stairs to a minimum and ensure that the new extension did not dominate the existing buildings. That meant breaking through into the orangery undercroft and supporting the stalls on ‘sleeper’ walls running at right angles to the stage.

When we looked at these walls in plan, and overlaid them onto the original supporting walls running parallel to the stage, we realised we had the makings of a subterranean labyrinth and, therefore, of an inexpensive and energy-efficient cooling system.

And that’s what we’ve built. The ground beneath the building and the masonry walls of the new labyrinth provide a natural cold store through which outside air passes on a long and convoluted route, getting cooled on the way. Two large fans, located beneath the floor at the start of the labyrinth, draw air through the southern wall (where the original builders, obligingly, incorporated suitable sunken openings), which then passes through 150 metres of labyrinthine passage and, finally, emerges into the auditorium beneath the seats of the stalls. Vents above the auditorium and stage ensure that the warmer air inside the auditorium is released from the building.

The fans remain running through the cool of the night, dropping the temperature of the earth and walls again. The following evening they will be sufficiently cold to repeat the cycle and cool the auditorium.

The design of this cooling system is not based on exact science and, in this first season of its use, there may be some need for fine-tuning. By next season, however, we should have got the hang of it and brow moppings will be a thing of the past.

AUDITORIUM

GROUND LEVEL

GROUND LEVEL STAGE LABYRINTH ORCHESTRA PIT

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Labyrinths A true labyrinth (as opposed to a maze) has one entry, one finishing point and no intersections. It does not, therefore, require the walker to make any choices.

The most enduring story of a labyrinth is the Cretan Labyrinth, which is depicted as a complex of masonry passages leading to a central space where the Minotaur had his lair. King Minos fed the Minotaur a tribute of seven youths and seven maidens exacted every nine years from the defeated Athenians.

Theseus, son of King Aegeus, enlisted as one of the seven youths with the aim of ending this practice, managed to enlist the aid of Ariadne, daughter of Minos, who fell in love with him. She gave Theseus a magic sword to slay the Minotaur and a skein of thread to unroll on his way through the labyrinth, which had been so cleverly designed by Daedalus as to be deemed impossible of human solution.

Having dispatched the Minotaur, Theseus followed the thread to retrace his route and then took Ariadne away with him. But he left her asleep on Naxos, explaining later that Dionysus had appeared in a dream and told him to do so.

While approaching home, he neglected to raise the white sails that were to be tokens of victory, so that his old father, seeing the black ones with which the ship had sailed, committed suicide, and Theseus became king of Athens.

For further reading on the labyrinths and all its interpretations and manifestation, see Through the Labyrinth by Hermann Kern Presel 2000

“The sort of as-found aesthetic used is clearly just right for the Grange” David Lloyd Jones is a founding director of Studio E Architects. He is currently constructing the first commercial carbon–neutral building in the UK.

(below) The labyrinth under the audience at The Grange. In the foreground are the “steps” of the stalls seating and in the middle ground is the labyrinthine passage through which the air passes.

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Four centuries of building at The Grange Builders have worked on The Grange in every century since the first house was built here in 1660. The firm of R J Smith is the first to build in the 21st century – and probably no works have ever progressed as smoothly and rapidly in the past 350 years as they have in the last 10 months. Martin Smith and his site manager David Sloan have used the services of some of the finest craftsmen and builders in Hampshire. We record them here. (left) March 2001 Looking across the stalls from under the steelwork of the balcony. Within a month this ceiling was plastered and inset with 800 optic fibres depicting various constellations.

SETTING OUT ENGINEER Bob Oram MASTER BRICKLAYER Frank Mason Steve Phillimore BRICKLAYER Derek Robinson Paul Glendon FOREMAN - BRICKLAYER Morris Pond BRICKLAYER Lee Elkins Martin Bell Matthew Coal Matt Giles James Morgan Melvin Fielder SITE MANAGER David Sloan

MASTER CARPENTER Les Lambell ASSISTANT CARPENTER Daniel Lambell

EXCAVATOR OPERATOR Gerald Paine MASTER PLASTERER Tony Ede PLASTERER Daniel Carpenter ELECTRICIANS Jason Bayliss Jason Cutting Marc Lee Philip Law Russell Seymore Barry McDonald Gary Spencer

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ROOFING CARPENTER Daniel Robinson George McGhaugey CARPENTER Daniel Bailey Michael Mills Tony Kingsnorth Greg Lawson John Snazell Chris Hurley Dan Wood

LABOURER Charles Barstow Walter Parfitt Sam Sheehy FOREMAN - BRICKLAYER Trevor King BRICKLAYER Alan King Stephen King Nich Lund Andrew Jacobs BRICKLAYER & LABOURER Matthew Jacobs LABOURER Michael Byrne Mark Eastwood Billy Pike Lee Smith Robin White

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DEMOLITION Robert Goddard Dean Goodyear GROUNDWORKS SUPERVISOR Graham Hooker EXCAVATOR OPERATOR Chris Crow GROUNDWORKER Richard Crow Craig Gilbertson Gavin Hudders Grant Sanster Robert Lucas FORMWORK SUPERVISOR Russell Churchill FORMWORK FOREMAN George Jenson FORMWORK Brian Sculthorpe Mark Rix Martin Flynn Alan Copeland

TRADITIONAL METAL ROOF Stuart Morris Mark Pellett Mark Still KALZIP ROOF INSTALLER MANAGER Darren Drew KALZIP ROOF INSTALLER Gus Watson Mick Thomas Benjamin Neville LEADWORK Phillip Howells Michael Hawkins Phillip Howells Michael Hawkins VENTILATION ENGINEER MANAGER Bob Attwood Richard Bottle VENTILATION ENGINEER Tom Harrison Dave Longhurst Phillip Longhurst Dave Early

SCAFFOLDING SUPERVISION Geoffrey Smith SCAFFOLDERS Alan Swain Mark Fielder Gary Clothier Lee Clements Paul Farrelly Alec Turner Lewis Woods Gary Meadings Lee Clothier Darren Glott Robert Fielder Michael Attrill Lewis Renie Joe Standsbridge David Healy Michael Barnes PLUMBER Les Merritt FLOOR & CARPET LAYER Roger Phillips

CONCRETE PUMP OPERATOR Peter Gin CONCRETER William Barnes Alan McKay STEELWORK FABRICATOR Chris Alderson STEEL ERECTOR Dave Brown Leigh Neighbour

(below) Martin Smith was born in Whitchurch, Hampshire, 46 years ago and started in the building industry as a trainee surveyor with H N Edwards in Basingstoke. He finished his degree, then joined the family business, R J Smith, which he took over from his uncle six years ago. He has been fascinated by historic buildings and research since he was 16 and has worked on Fort Belvedere, The Vyne, Mottisfont Abbey, Stratfield Saye House, Hinton Ampner and many other great buildings. He now adds The Grange to his list.

STEELFIXER Danny Saunders Shoen Murphy WELDER Tom Caulcutt DRY LINING SUPERVISOR George Smith PLASTERER William Annals

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The History of The Grange The Grange is one of the great classic houses of England and one of the earliest – and finest – examples of the Greek Revival period which swept Europe in the early 19th century. It was designed by William Wilkins, architect of the National Gallery, who set it in one of the most idyllic and unspoilt rural landscapes anywhere in Britain. There was a fine 17th century five-storey house already on the site, and Wilkins constructed his temple as an overcoat around it. All of this original five-storey red

brick building, by William Samwell, still survives inside the temple.

Wilkins’ client was the banker Henry Drummond, who grew tired of the project before it was complete and sold it to his neighbour Alexander Baring, later the first Lord Ashburton. Ashburton decided to extend the already massive structure and in 1817 commissioned Robert Smirke, who went on to design the British Museum, to add a single storey wing. By the time he died in 1848, Ashburton had

1263 ALICE DE FRANKLYN leases 36 acres to Hyde Abbey on which to build a grange, or granary

THE OWNERS 1662 THE HENLEY FAMILY

1539 The estate passed to the Crown at the Dissolution

1641 SIR BENJAMIN TICHBOURNE

THE ARCHITECTS

THEIR BUILDINGS

c. 1670

1764

WILLIAM SAMWELL Builds a five–floor brick country house, possibly on an unused site

ROBERT ADAM Designs a kitchen block and a naturalistic landscape with a lake, a bridge and a folly

WILLIAM SAMWELL

ROBERT ADAM

Eaton Hall, Cheshire 1674 parts of Ham House, Richmond 1672–77

Kenwood House, London 1767–69 Apsley House, London 1771–78

1700

1600

20

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commissioned C R Cockerell to build a second temple as a conservatory (now our theatre) in 1823 and F P Cockerell, his son, to add a second storey to the Smirke wing 20 years later.

In 1824 C R Cockerell wrote “I shall never get entirely out of Smirke’s manner in my first works. I appealed to Smirke in all things & nothing but 7 years freedom and travel could ever relieve me from the master’s spell” While Verdi was composing Traviata in the 1850s,

Harriet Ashburton, wife of the second Lord Ashburton, who was said to be “the most conspicuous woman in the society of the present day”, was hosting grand house parties at the Grange for the political and literary élite, including Carlyle and Thackeray (see page 87). The house fell upon harder times in the 1930s and the Barings sold it to Charles Wallach in 1934, the same year that Cole Porter wrote Anything Goes. The present Lord Ashburton bought it back 30 years later.

1934 first performance Boston ANYTHING GOES

1853 first performance Venice LA TRAVIATA

1954 first performance Venice THE TURN OF THE SCREW 1964 JOHN BARING now Lord Ashburton

1817 THE BARING FAMILY

1934 CHARLES WALLACH

1787 THE DRUMMOND FAMILY

1975 Placed in the guardianship of ENGLISH HERITAGE

1795–1800 leased to THE PRINCE OF WALES later George IV

1804

c.1820 1823

1852

ROBERT SMIRKE Builds a single–storey private wing to the west

1868

JOHN COX Restructures interior

C R COCKERELL F P COCKERELL Builds the Conservatory Adds a second storey to and an elegant dining room Smirke’s west wing WILLIAM WILKINS Transforms the exterior of Samwell’s house into a Greek temple

WILLIAM WILKINS Theatre Royal, Bury St Edmunds 1819 National Gallery, London 1834–38 ROBERT SMIRKE Covent Garden Theatre, London 1808, now destroyed The British Museum, London 1823–47 C R COCKERELL Law Library, Cambridge 1837–42 Ashmolean, Oxford 1841–45

2000

1900

1800

F P COCKERELL Nos 1 & 2 South Audley Street, London 1878

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Corporate Supporters 2002 production sponsors

the studs trust dr christopher ondaatje the carphone warehouse

who have made

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e

special contributions towards this festival

Alfred McAlpine Construction Ltd Deutsche Bank AG Laurent Perrier The Jerwood Foundation Denton Wilde Sapte

Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein S G Hambros

Allied Irish Bank C J Coleman GCI Gieves & Hawkes GNI touch Kroll Buchler Phillips Merrill Lynch Investment Managers Reed Elsevier Reuters Royal Bank of Scotland Travers Smith Braithwaite

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PATRON The Rt Hon Lord Ashburton KG BOARD Sir David Davies (Chairman) The Rt Hon Lord Ashburton KG Iain Burnside Simon Freakley William Garrett Wasfi Kani OBE The Hon Mary-Ann Sheehy APPEAL COMMITTEE William Garrett (Chairman) Gerald Acher Francis Baring The Hon Mark Baring William Charnley Lady Davies Mark Evans Jacob Grierson The Hon Mrs Erskine Guinness Charles Haddon-Cave Patrick Hungerford John Jay Adam Lee James Lupton Tom Lynch Dr Harvey McGregor Lady Northbrook Dr Christopher Ondaatje David R W Potter David Pountney Bruce Powell David Ross John Salkeld Victoria Sharp The Hon Jeremy Soames Amanda Wakeley

CHIEF EXECUTIVE Wasfi Kani EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR Michael Moody FINANCE DIRECTOR Carol Butler COMPANY MANAGER Ann Somerville APPEAL CO-ORDINATOR Rachel Pearson PRODUCTION MANAGER Alison Ritchie HOUSE MANAGER Judith Becher BOX OFFICE MANAGER Jo Partridge ADMINISTRATIVE ASST. Nadja Mayow Coyne

GRANGE PARK OPERA 5 Chancery Lane London EC4A 1BU Tel. 020 7320 5586 Fax. 020 7320 5429 Charity no 1068046 VAT no 710241984

THANKS TO Lady Salomon Michael Fontes John Redmill Lord and Lady Northbrook Mrs Jo Muir

Alexander & Mary Creswell Itchen Stoke Estates Dr Harvey McGregor Mrs Louis Franck The Golden Bottle

Claire & Hugh Peppiatt Tim Kempster Mark Lacey Lovells Dyers Trust

K O’Hauge Anthony Johnson Peter Lyndon-Skeggs Joachim Kerfack The Countess of Iveagh

THE ENSEMBLE appears in Anything Goes and La Traviata. Several artists are principal covers during the Festival or principal artists in the sixweek Arts Council subsidised tour of La Traviata to regional theatres which takes place in the autumn Rachel Chapman Lorna Stephens Michaela Davies Naomi Fulton Joanna Gamble Rebecca Gale

Richard Barrowclough Hamish Brown David Menezes Andres Hernandez Salazar Gordon Adams Trevor Connor

Ewan Taylor Phil Aiden Michael Broughton Chris Jarvis Lee Mariner Dean Ellis

Lisa Donmall Tiffany Graves Carly Hainsby Helen Harper Summer Strallen

THE THERMOI provide invaluable help before and during the Festival Penny Ackroyd Jean Amos Martha Berry Sue Bristow Sue Brown Virginia Collett Nikki Cowley

Louise Cox Pru & Douglas de Lavison Moni Goode Lizzie Holmes Inge Hunter Charmian Jones Angela Larard

Susie Lintott Gayle McDermott Patricia Neri Sue Paice Victoria Parker Jo Seligman Ann & Mike Smart

Joan Taylor Sarah Tillie Barbara & Don Woods Louise Woods

Rehearsal répétiteurs Jeremy Cooke (Screw) Louise Hunt (Goes) Lesley Anne Sammons (Traviata)

Festival Costume Supervisor Sarah Bowern

Senior Stage Manager Sally Lindsay-German Stage Managers Sara Chapman Sara Jennings Deputy Stage Manager Steve Cressy Assistant Stage Managers Anthony Bobb-Semple Melissa Currie Alastair Brain

Senior Chief Electrician Francis Stephenson

Hats Chloe Simcox

Sets constructed & painted by Scene & Theme

Wigs Campbell Young Chris Redman

Tracking by Stage Electrics

Casting Consultant Jill Green (Goes) Language Coach (Traviata) Gabriella Dall’Olio

Master Carpenter Ian Evans Deputy Master Carpenter Arthur Turner Senior Stage technician James Jenner Stage technicians Stephen Spillman Alan Hardcastle James McKerracher PRESS & PUBLICITY Jill Franklin Franklin Morrow Communications

Costume Supervisor Amanda Cole (Goes) Wardrobe Mistress Alyson Fielden Props Supervisor Claire Lovett

Costume makers Carol Coates Boris Horsfield Caroline Hughes Elsa Threadgold Tailor Alan Seltzer Costume hire Angels & Bermans Cosprop HOUSEKEEPER Lorna Clive Assisted by Katie Woods Jane Little Sarah Stevens

PROGRAMME Wasfi Kani & friends

Cover Olivier Ferrer

Programme design Tiao Sutchinda Rangsi Thompson

Printed by Earle & Ludlow Philip Ellis

Stage flowers The Real Flower Company Stage champagne Moet et Chandon Ushers Carol Roe Gillian Macaulay

Chief Electrician Kate Greaves Deputy Electrician Tom Farrington

Student Stage Manager Amy Almond

Lighting by Whitelight Video monitors Photon (TG) Ltd

THE GROUNDS Douglas de Lavison John & Victoria Salkeld Ian Conduct SCENIC ART Liz Kramers Victoria Salkeld

Images Bridgeman Art Library Clive Barda Alexander Salkeld Julian Sturdy Morton

Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders. In some cases this has proved impossible. We would be pleased to hear from any copyright holder not contacted.

THE RESTAURANT Food by Nicky Sherlock Catering

Restaurant managed by Anthony Lane & Heidi Coles

Champagne Laurent Perrier

Water Ashe Park Mineral Water

Solicitors DENTON WILDE SAPTE Alistair Collett Pam Clarke

Accountants BAKER TILLEY Alan Jones

Planning Consultants NATHANIEL LICHFIELD Iain Rhind

Traffic Consultants RPS Colin Mackay

Grange Park Opera is a registered charity. Its Board of Directors is the Charity Trustees and will be Trustees of the Endowment Fund Lord Ashburton and his family own the site; they placed The Grange in the guardianship of English Heritage in 1975 and have extended the term of the lease until 2018

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Nerys Jones (Dorabella), Sally Matthews (Fiordiligi) in CosĂŹ fan tutte Grange Park Opera 2001

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The Notable Greeks 2002 Our members, The Schools of Hippocrates, Archimedes and Plato, support the festival on an annual basis with donations of between £600 and £150. Their numbers have now reached 800. This is the upper end of the target we originally set and so one or more of these “Schools” will close to new members. All current members will be contacted in July. If you are not a member and would like information, please email info@grangeparkopera.co.uk or use the contact details on page 24.

The School of Hippocrates Mrs J Adrienne Amos Veira & Andrew Bailey Jane Bird Adrian Bott Anonymous Mr & Mrs Roy D Brown Anthony Bunker Anonymous The Hayden Trust Mr & Mrs Peter Clarke Christopher Clarke QC and the Revd Caroline Clarke Sir Anthony Cleaver Veronica Cohen Sally Coryn David & Nikki Cowley Mr Carl Cullingford Michael Cuthbert Mr Michael C A Eaton Mr & Mrs Graham Elliott Mrs Stuart Errington Mark and Madeleine Fleming Mr & Mrs Geoffrey Fuller Mr Graham Fuller Mr & Mrs David Gawler Jackie & Michael Gee Anonymous Mrs Manuela Granziol Mr & Mrs Christopher Grierson Mr & Mrs Timothy Hamilton Mr & Mrs David Harris Malcolm Herring Mr Philip Heslop QC Liz Hewitt Lord Holme of Cheltenham Mr & Mrs J B Holmes Dr Peter & Mrs Judith Iredale Ian & Noelle Irvine Martin Jay CBE DL Mr & Mrs Ian Jay Mr Derek Johns

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Mr Anthony Johnson Michel Kallipetis QC Liz & Roger Kramers Mr & Mrs Malcolm Le May Paul Lee Lady Lever Mr William Massey QC Mr Michael Matantos Ian & Debrah McIsaac Mr Richard Morse Heike & Cameron Munro Colin Murray Mr Murray Stuart CBE Mr & Mrs Peter Nathan Mr & Mrs Jay A Nawrocki Lt Col The Hon Guy Norrie H S H Princess Paul Odescalchi Mrs Charles Parker Anonymous Mr & Mrs Anthony Pitt-Rivers Mr Charles Purle Mrs Faanya Rose Jeremy A F Rothman Mr Andrew Soundy Crispin & Jo Southgate Sir James & Lady Spooner Geoff Squire OBE Mr Denis K Tinsley Beatrice Vincenzini-Warrender Anonymous Mr John L P Whiter Mr & The Hon Mrs S Wigart Mr Philip Williams Mark and Jane Williams Anonymous Mr & Mrs David Wootton

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The School of Archimedes Ann & Martin Adeney Mr Robin Aisher OBE Mr & Mrs Christopher Aldous Anthony & Louise Alexander Lady Allan Mrs Genie Allenby Mr & Mrs David Anderson Anonymous R B Backhouse Mr & Mrs N Backhouse Richard & Delia Baker Mr & Mrs J Balfour Anonymous Mr Nicholas Barker Mr Charles Bartholomew Mrs Michael Beresford-West The Hon Mrs Julian Berry Mr & Mrs D Betancor Charles Wallach admirer Mrs Toby Blackwell Lisa Bolgar Smith Mr & Mrs Ernest Boost Mr John A H Bootes FRCS, FRCOG Anthony Boswood QC Robert Bowler Mr & Mrs Nigel à Brassard Mr & Mrs David Brewer Mr & Mrs Paul Brewer Mr & Mrs Douglas Bridgewater Mr Nicholas Brigstoke Robin & Jill Broadley Adam & Sarah Broke Mr & Mrs James Bromhead Mr Keith Bromley Dorothy & John Brook Consuelo & Anthony Brooke Mr & Mrs Antony Brooking Mr & Mrs Charles H Brown Mrs Sue Brown Mr Christopher Brown Mr & Mrs Thomas Buckley Mr & Mrs Geoffrey Burnand Mr & Mrs C Butler Richard Butler Adams Mr & Mrs Nicholas Callinan Mr & Mrs Peter Carden Mrs Elizbeth Carr Stevens Mr & Mrs David Carrow Mrs Marigold Charrington Mr Shane Chichester Susie Lintott & Louisa Church Mrs Anthony Clark Mr & Mrs L John Clark Ann Clarke Ian Clarkson & Richard Morris John Coke Mr & Mrs Richard Collin Dr Neville Conway

Prof & Mrs R C Cookson Mrs Helen Cormack Mr & Mrs Richard Cotton Richard Cowen David Craig Mr J G Curtis William Dacombe Kathrine Davies Mr & Mrs John Dear Mr & Mrs Michael Del Mar Michael & Rachel Dickson Helen Dorey R Dorey Lady Drake Mrs Christopher Duffett Mr & Mrs John Dunstan Mr & Mrs Kenneth Eckett Mr & Mrs Symon Elliott Mrs Basil de Ferranti Ms Sian Fisher Mrs L J Fleming Mrs Thomas Floyd Dr T H & Dr J M Foley Michael & Margaret Fowle Mrs Jane Fraser Mr & Mrs David Gamble Sir Mark & Lady Garthwaite Mr John George Mr Roger Gifford Mr & Mrs James Glancy Enrique Biel Gleeson Cassandra Goad Mr & Mrs Graham Maw The Hon Mrs Jane Green Mick & Denise Green Sir Ronald Grierson Mrs Susie Gwyn Max and Catherine Hadfield Mr Andrew Haigh Mrs Peter Hall Roger and Annie Hancock Mr Benjamin Hargreaves Jocelin & Cherry Harris John & Sophie Hastings-Bass Lady Hawkings Mr Philip Henstock Martin & Alicia Herbert Mr & Mrs Peter Hewett Mr Michael Hewett John & Catherine Hickman Camelicat Mr Christopher Holdsworth Hunt Mr Anthony Holland Mr David Holland Mrs Alexandra Homan Mr Ian Hopkins Mr & Mrs Robert Horne Anonymous

Mr & Mrs David Hunter Mr & Mrs Peter Hutson Pamela Jacobs Jane & Jimmy James Dr & Mrs Ivan Johnson Alan & Judi Jones Dr Alan Jordan Prof J L & Dr F R Jowell Mr Charlie Kehela BSc MBCS Mr & Mrs G Kennedy Andrew Kennedy & Lindsay Cornish Mr & Mrs Colin Keogh Mr K P Kissane The Hon Isabelle Laurent Mr & Mrs Douglas de Lavison Anonymous Mr & Mrs Peter Leaver Mr & Mrs Dan Levin Jeremy Gardner Lewis Mr & Mrs Gareth Lewis Anonymous Mr Robin Mackenzie Mr Alistair Mackintosh Sir Nevil Macready BT CBE Mr Tim Martin Mr & Mrs Nicholas Mason Sarah B Mason Mr Bruce Mauleverer Dr Valentine U McHardy Mr & Mrs C N Menzies-Wilson Mr & Mrs Cliff Middleton Mr & Dr D B Mitchell Brigid & Freddie Monkhouse Dr & Mrs Patrick Moore Anonymous Mrs Roger Morris Lady Muir Wood Mr W M Muirhead Anonymous Mr & Hon Mrs J Ogilvie Thompson Mrs Eugene O’Keeffe Sir Peter Osborne Nick & Lavinia Owen Mr & Mrs Robert Page Anonymous Stephen & Isobel Parkinson Mr & Mrs Donald Payne Nigel & Liz Peace Michael Pearl Mr & Mrs Donald Pearse Mrs June Pearson Mr & Mrs Peter Peddie Robin Petherick Mr & Mrs Charles Pinney Matthew Pintus David & Christina Pitman Mr & Mrs John Platt

Mr & Mrs Ian Posgate Jan & Michael Potter Mrs Jane Poulter Mr & Mrs Julien Prevett Mr Richard Price Sally & Peter Procopis Mr Anthony Pullinger Stephen Pyne Mr John Rank Mr & Mrs Nigel Reavley Mr John Redmill Mike & Jessamy Reynolds Mr & Mrs Anthony Richmond-Watson G Michael Rivkin Mr Andrew Robb Mr & Mrs J Roberts Mr & Mrs E J M Ross Mr & Mrs James Roundell Barry & Anne Rourke Mr & Mrs Antony Rowe Mr & Mrs Peter Scoble Sir James & Lady Scott Tony Shearer Mr & Mrs Donald Sherlock Colonel Smart MBE Mrs Marveen Smith Fiona Smith-Bingham Prof & Mrs Peter Sonksen Mrs Charles Speke Nigel & Johanna Stapleton Johan & Christelle Steyn Mr Julian Sturdy-Morton Mrs Timothy Syder Phillip & Caroline Sykes Mr & Mrs Nigel Teare Mr & Mrs David Thomas Mrs James Thorp Simon Thorp Mr & Mrs Max Thum Mrs Michael Tussaud Mr John Verrill Mrs Peter Wake DL Mr & Mrs David Wake-Walker Mr & Mrs David Walker Mrs Malcolm Wallis Simon Ward Mr John N Wates Mrs Charles Williams Professor Roger Williams CBE Mr Jeremy Willoughby Mr P S Wilmot-Sitwell Mr Olof Winkler von Stiernhielm David & Vivienne Woolf Richard Youell Anonymous Rt Hon Lord Young of Graffham DL

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The School of Plato Tim & Philippa Abell Mrs Tikki Adorian Janet & Michael Aidin Sir Richard & Lady Aikens Mrs Peter Ainsley Mrs Rosemary Alexander Ms Pam Alexander Professor B G Allison Anonymous Mr J C P Amos Mrs Angela Anderson Mr Christopher Anderson Robert & Janice Atkin Jane & Robert Avery Felicity Bagenal Mr & Mrs Nicholas Bagshawe Mrs Grenfell Bailey M Bailey Richard W Baker Richard & Jean Baldwin Mrs Anne Balfour-Fraser Mrs George Band Anonymous Lady Emma Barnard Mr H Vivian Baron-Cohen ACA Mr Simon R Barrow Mrs Charles Barton Howard Baveystock Richard Bayley Jeremy Bayliss Mr Nigel Beale Lord & Lady Beaumont of Whitley Mr Rupert Beaumont Baron C von Bechtolsheim Nicholas Bedford Mr Peter Bell Anonymous Christopher Bellew Christina & Timothy Benn Mr Julian Benson Mrs John Bevan Mrs Christopher Bevan Mr & Mrs Michael Biddle Mrs Alastair Black Mr & Mrs Charles Blackmore Tricia & Michael Blakstad Mrs Jenny Bland Elisabeth & Bob Boas Mrs Margaret Bolam Mr Michael D Bolton Mr A G Bompas Mrs D C Bonsall Mr & Mrs Edward Booth-Clibborn Mr Edward Bostock CBE Mr & Mrs W Neville Bowen Julian Bower Dr & Mrs Keith Bradley Anonymous Viscount & Viscountess Bridgeman Anonymous Charles Brims Dr Amanda Britton Robin & Penny Broadhurst Mr Charles Bromfield Mr & Mrs Simon Brooks Jonathan Brown Tanya Bruce-Lockhart Dr Ann Buchanan Mrs Penny Buik John Bunnell Mr Martin Burton Anonymous Mr Clive Butler Sarah Butler-Sloss Mr A J Carruthers Andrew & Jacquie Cartwright Denis & Ronda Cassidy Clifford & Judy Catt Peter & Diana Cawdron Mr Graham Cawsey The Hon Mrs A R Cecil Anonymous The Lord & Lady Chesham

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Ann Chillingworth Mrs Kate Christopherson MBE Lady Clark Mr Christopher Clark Mrs D Clarkson Mr & Mrs J H Clay Adam Cleal Esq Bruce Cleave Mrs Susie Clegg Mrs Laurence Colchester Mr Jeremy Cole Dr Mavis Conway Roger F A Cooke Mr George Cooper Mrs Stuart Corbyn Mr & Mrs Matthew Cosans Anonymous Mr & Mrs Alan L Craft Lady Julia Craig-Harvey Dr D N Croft Mr J D Crosland Mr Tom Cross Brown Mr David Crowe Mr & Mrs Nigel Crump Elizabeth & Rene Dalucas Mr Michael Davis Mr Robert Dean James Denham Esq. Patrick Despard Mr Adrian C Dewey Mrs Sally B Dewey Mrs Kenneth Dibben Mr & Mrs L Dibden Dr Michael Dingle Mr & Mrs Robert Dixon Christine Douse Captain & Mrs Spencer Drummond Mr & Mrs R Drury Anonymous Hugh Dumas Mr & Mrs Jamie Dundas Mrs Dickie Dutton Mr J M Dyson Eleri Ebenezer Philippa & Sean Eddie Vernon & Hazel Ellis Michael & Wendy Evans Mr Peter Evans Mr Roger Facer CB S F G Fachada Mark & Lucy Le Fanu Mr & Mrs Edward Farquharson Helen Faulkner Nicholas & Jane Ferguson Miss Clare M Ferguson Mr Michael Fitzgerald Mr & Mrs Brian Fitzpatrick Mr Leslie Fletcher J A Floyd Charitable Trust Michael Forrest Jerome Foster James Fox-Andrews Mrs Joyce Fuller Mrs Lindsay Gardener Mr Ian Gatt Mr & Mrs A Gavin Mr & Mrs Robert Gayner Jacqueline & Jonathan Gestetner Keith Gilham & Christine Cutler Mr & Mrs Martin Gillie Mrs Bruce Ginsberg Mr & Mrs T F Goad The Rev Simon Godfrey DL Anonymous Mr & Mrs Stuart Goldsmith Mrs Karen Goodison Mr Adrian Goodman John & Tanny Gordon John Gordon Suzanne Graham-Dixon Mr Jean Grall Mrs Minnie Greayer Mr & Mrs Anthony Green David & Barbara Greggains

John & Ann Grieves Mr & Mrs Edmund Grower Mr Marcus Grubb Dr & Mrs Klaus Günther Mrs G S Guerrini The Hon Erskine Guinness Mrs Rodney Hall Mrs Allyson Hall Mr & Mrs R Hambro Mrs Alexandra Hamm David & Judith Hankinson Mr R W Harris Wendell Harris Esq Mr Julian Harvey Dr Fred Haslam Mr & Mrs Roy Hatch Emma Heber Percy Basil Henley Mr & Mrs Alan Herring Mrs M Heseltine Dr & Mrs Hession Mr & Mrs John Hewett John Heywood Mr John Heywood Mrs D K Hill Mrs P M Hingston Mr & Mrs P R Hinton Marianne Hinton Mrs Joyce Hitchcock Mr R E Hofer Mr B G C Holding-Parsons Mr & Mrs Mark Holford John & Hilary Holmes Dr & Mrs Peter Honey Anonymous David & Mal Hope-Mason Elaine & Nigel Horder Juliet Horsman Barbara Hosking CBE Mr & Mrs W N J Howard Steven Howarth Anonymous Miles Hudson Mrs William Hughes Robert Hugill Ms Siu Fun Hui Mr Nigel Humphreys Mr & Mrs C D Hunt Mrs Duncan Hunter Mr & Mrs A Hunter Johnston Mrs June Hurst-Brown Graham & Amanda Hutton Colonel & Mrs Colin Huxley Mrs Madeleine Hyde Mrs E Hyde Howard & Anne Hyman Lord & Lady Inchyra Dr & Mrs G Stuart Ingram Christopher Jackson Mrs R James Mr & Mrs C J Jamieson Mr & Mrs Ian Jamieson Mr & Mrs David Jamieson Mr Peter Jay Mr David Jeffers Lady Jellicoe Mr Nicholas Jonas OBE DL Anonymous Avril Jones John Gordon Jowett Lord & Lady Judd Dr Leon Kaufman Ms Helen Kellie Mrs Peter Kent Mr Jonathan G N King Mr & Mrs Oliver Kinsey Mr & Mrs Nadim Korban Dr R Hubert Laeng-Danner Mr Brian Lanaghan Toby Landau & Nudrat Majeed Rear Admiral John Lang Mrs B Langevad Mr Jonathan Lass Mrs Patricia Latham

Mr & Mrs Bill Lawes Mrs Natalie Lee John A Leek Mrs June S L Lees-Spalding Jan Leigh & Jan Rynkiewicz David Lester Mrs Brian Levy Mrs Jeremy Lewis Mr Eric Leyns Mr & Mrs A J Lightfoot Mr & Mrs Anthony Littlejohn Mr & Mrs David Livermore Mrs Susie Long Anne Longden Brigadier Desmond Longfield Mrs Simon Loup Eric & Clare Lowry Mrs Charlotte W Lulham J A Lundberg Mr & Mrs Nicholas Lyons Mrs S MacDermot Mr James Macdonald-Buchanan Mr Bruce Macfarlane Mr & Mrs James Mackintosh Mr Andrew Maconie Mr & Mrs David Maitland David & Mary Male Hon T J Manners Mrs C A Marston Mr & Mrs McCann Rosalind McCarthy Philippa McGeough Mr & Mrs Christopher McLaren The Hon Michael & Mrs McLaren Mrs C McNeil Mrs Jane McVittie William Merton Dr Bryan Middle Dr & Mrs Patrick Mill Peter Miller Sir John Milne Dr Michael & Elizabeth Minton Mr & Mrs Charles Mitchell Mr & Mrs P W Mommersteeg Mr William Monk Vivienne Monk & Derek Roebuck Mrs Ronald Munro Ferguson Mrs Michael Morel Mr & Mrs Ian Morrison Clive & Sue Mortimer Alastair & Sara Morton Tom & Brenda Muir Mrs Sudhir Mulji Dr Douglas Munro-Faure Mrs John Nangle Lady Neave Mr & Mrs B W Neumann Jeremy & Elizabeth Nicholson George Nissen Sir Edwin & Lady Nixon Hon Michael & Mrs Nolan Mr Mark Norris The Lord & Lady Northbrook Amanda & Francis Norton Mr M S Norton Mr & Mrs D Novakovic Mr John Offord Anthony & Lorraine Ogden Mrs John Oldacre Charles & Ro Orange Mr & Mrs Michael Orr Mrs Rosalind Osmer Miss V H Owen John Paine Mr Patrick Palmer Mr & Mrs George Palmer Mrs Charles Palmer-Tomkinson Mrs Roderick Parker Mrs Blake Parker Clive & Deborah Parritt Paul Pattinson Drs N & J Pearce

John & Jacqui Pearson Nigel & Ann Pearson Mrs C Peat Mr & Mrs Anthony Peck Anonymous Mr & Mrs Peter Peirse-Duncombe Claudia & Charles Pendred Mr Erik Penser Max & Julia Perrin Mr Charles Petre Mr R B Petre Jonathan & Gillian Pickering Mr & Mrs Anthony Pinsent Mrs Barry Pinson Richard Plummer The Countess of Portsmouth Mr & Mrs R Pound Mr Dominic Powell Mr & Mrs Michael Pragnell Ms Irene Preiswerk Mr James K Prentice LLB George & Jean Price Jennifer Priestley Judith & David Pritchard Mr & Mrs Stephen Proctor Mrs Rosalind Quaife Mrs Chris Quayle Grant & Shirley Radcliffe G B Raingold Denzil Rankine Mr & Mrs Angus Rankine Mrs Franceska Rapkin Anonymous Mr & Mrs John Rees The Hon Philip Remnant Mr Bill Birch Reynardson CBE Mrs A A Dales Mrs Anthony Rimell Jill Ritblat Mr & Mrs Rivett-Carnac Mr & Mrs C Road Mr & Mrs Miles Roberts Mrs A A Robertson Mrs Eric Robinson Margaret G Robshaw Mr & Mrs Alexander Roe Cdr Keith Rogerson RN Rtd Mr Michael Rogerson T D Mrs Hilke Roundell Mr Alan Roxburgh Joan & Lewis Rudd Mr Ken Rushton Mrs Susan Russell-Jones Michael & Giustina Ryan Mr Richard Sage Mr & Mrs William Saunders Mr Peter Saverys Mrs Judith Sawdy Mrs John Schofield Sebastian & Lindsey Scotney Mr & Mrs A M Scott Colin Scott-Malden Mr & Mrs James Sehmer Mr George Seligman James Seymour Mr Christopher Shaw Mrs Simon Shaw Tom & Mimi Siebens Prof David & Mrs Gillian Silverman Andrew H Simon OBE Mr & Mrs Peter Simor Mr & Mrs Mark Simpson Jonathan Sims Ian Skeet Sir Jock Slater Mr & Mrs Anthony Slingsby Russell A Smart Mr & Mrs Robin Smeeton Mr & Mrs T H Snagge Mr & Mrs Philip Snuggs Mr Ian Southward Mr & Mrs Jeremy Spencer Dr M St George Wilson Mr Ian St John

Geoffrey Stavert MBE Richard Steel Mr & Mrs Christian Stenderup Brian Stevens Mr & Mrs Christopher Stewart Mr & Mrs Hugh Stewart Mr & Mrs Roger Stiles The Countess of Strafford Anonymous Mr Toby Stubbs Major John Sturgis MC Mrs A P Sutcliffe Anonymous Mr & Mrs T Sweet-Escott Mr & Mrs T J Sykes Richard P Woods Mr & Mrs John Taylor Mrs P M Taylor Mr & Mrs S A Taylor Mr & Mrs P M Thomas Mr & Mrs Anthony Thompson Mr & Mrs John Thompson-Ashby Mrs A J Thorman Mrs Ann Thornton Mr & Mrs R Tickner Mrs Colin Tillie Mr & Mrs G W Tindley Jill & Michael Todd Mr & Mrs G Todd Mrs Anna Tognetti & Mr Claude Baignères Mr & Mrs Alexander Trotter Eric & Penelope Tudor Lady Tumim OBE L C Varnavides Mr Mano Vayis Mr & Mrs Peter Verity Brigadier & Mrs H R W Vernon Mr & Mrs Hugo Vickers X N C Villers Esq Major General Charles Vyvyan Mrs Christine Walker Mrs S R S Walker Sir Tim & Lady Walker Mr Tony Walker Mrs Jane Walllace Mrs Denise Wallace George & Pat Wallace Mr & Mrs R Wallhouse Dr Sarah Wallis Mr & Mrs K Watson Dr Kenneth Watters Colin & Suzy Webster Christian Wells Miss M Wells Dr Bryan Wells Mr Mark Weston Mr Graham Westwell Mr Simon Wethered Mr & Mrs Julian Whately Katharine Whitaker Anonymous Mr & Mrs Harvey White Mr & Mrs John Whiteley Piers & Antonia Whitley Mrs Christopher Whitley Dr J & G A Williams Mr & Mrs Geoffrey Williams Mr Hamish Williams Mr & Mrs Patrick J d’A Willis David Wills Michael & Alyson Wilson Lady Wilson Mr Tom Wilson Mr Roy Withers CBE Jonathan & Candida Woolley David & Vicky Wormsley Richard Worthington Anonymous Ian Wylie Mr R B Yearsley

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for help with the project in forwinchester help with theprison project in thanks to winchester prison thanks to Judith & Richard Becher Virginia & Mike Collett Judith & Richard Becher Mr & Mrs Fenn-Smith Virginia & Mike Collett Mr Harvey Mr&&Mrs MrsJulian Fenn-Smith Robert & Angela Larard Mr & Mrs Julian Harvey Douglas Pru de Larard Lavison Robert && Angela Charles & Su Marriott Douglas & Pru de Lavison Melissa Perkins Charles & Su Marriott BernardMelissa & Amanda Stebbings Perkins David& &Amanda Louise Wood Bernard Stebbings Officer Eddie Burke David & Louise Wood Officer Bernie Lendon Eddie Burke Governor Kelly Bernie Alan Lendon Governor Kahner AlanSara Kelly Ivan SaraAugustus Kahner Maddie Heaney Ivan Augustus Officer Mick Stokes Maddie Heaney Officer Watts MickMark Stokes Annie McKean Mark Watts Jill Franklin Annie McKean Jill Franklin

west side story director Michael Moody

set designer Tania Spooner

costume designer Sarah Bowern

movement Andrew George

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Founders

who contributed to the first opera festival at Grange Park in 1998

Olympians & Titans Mr Mark Andrews Mr Felix Appelbe BSc FRSA Mr Peter Arengo-Jones OBE Mr David Buchler Mr William F Charnley Professor Ian Craft

Lydia & Miles d'Arcy-Irvine Sir David & Lady Davies Mr Peter Foy Mr Simon Freakley Mr William Gronow Davis Mr Michael Hoare

Mr & Mrs Donald Kahn Mr T Landon James & Béatrice Lupton Mr & Mrs Charles Mackay Mr Harvey McGregor QC Greg & Gail Melgaard

Mr & Mrs Hugh Peppiatt Mrs Lucinda Stevens Mr & Mrs Anthony Townsend Mr & Mrs Max Ulfane Mrs Marie Veeder Mr & Mrs Graham John West

Argonauts, Pythagoreans & Arcadians Mr & Mrs Gerald Acher Richard & Delia Baker Mr & Mrs Nicholas Baring Mr & Mrs Tom Bartlam Dori Bateson Mr Peter Bedford Mr & Mrs Robin Behar Mr Alan Bell Mr Keith Benham Mrs M Bennett Sir Christopher & Lady Bland Mrs Gerald Bland Mr & Mrs Simon Borrows Mr Graham Bourne Mr Peter Braunwalder Mr & Mrs Keith Bromley Mr Robin W T Buchanan Mr & Mrs Mark Burch Mrs James Butler Sir Euan Calthorpe BT Mr & Mrs Michael Campbell Mr Maximilian Carter Sir Peter & Lady Cazalet David & Elizabeth Challen Mr Oliver Colman Cynthia Colman Dr P M de Z Cooke Mr & Mrs Brian Cornish Mr Peter Davidson Guy Boney & Bente Dawkins Mr Peter Dicks Mr & Mrs Malcolm Edwards Austin & Ragna Erwin Mr T Alun Evans CMG Alastair & Robina Farley

Mr & Mrs J fforde Mr & Mrs Roger Fidgen Hamish & Sophie Forsyth Mr & Mrs Robin Fox Mr Andrew Frost Mr Stephen Frost Mr Nicholas R Gold Lady Shauna Gosling Mr & Mrs George Goulding Mr Verne Grinstead Mr Michael Gwinnell Mr Philip Gwyn Mr & Mrs Charles Haddon-Cave QC Mr & Mrs Philip Hallett Mr Clifford Hampton Mr Alan H Harrison Angela & David Harvey The Bulldog Trust Dr & Mrs James F Hill Mr & Mrs Hansgeorg Hofmann Mr Peter Holland Dr Jonathan Holliday Mr J P Hungerford Robin & Pat Ilbert The Countess of Iveagh Mr & Mrs Evan James Mr Martin Jay Mr & Mrs David Jervis Mr J T L Jervoise Neil & Elizabeth Johnson Mr & Mrs A N Joy Ms Walia Kani Mr Vincent Keaveny Maureen & Jim Kelly Mr Joachim Kerfack

Mr & Mrs David Leathers Mr & Mrs Adam Lee David & Linda Lloyd Jones Mr Simon Lofthouse Dr Peter Lyndon-Skeggs Mrs Stuart Macnaghten The Hon Dwight Makins Mr & Mrs Charles Marriott Mr John Marden Mr William Mather Wendy & Michael Max Mr & Mrs P N J May Mr & Mrs T McMaddy Mr Nigel McNair Scott Mr & Mrs A S McWhirter Mr James Meade Leni Lady Miller Mr & Mrs Patrick Mitford Slade Miss Charlotte Moore Elizabeth Morison Mr Michael J Morley Dr & Mrs Julian Muir Lord Neill of Bladen QC Sir Charles Nicholson Bt John & Dianne Norton John Julius Norwich Mr & Mrs Michael Orr Major General & Mrs Simon Pack Mark & Rachel Pearson Ron & Lyn Peet Mr & Mrs Nicholas Phelps-Brown The Countess of Portsmouth Mr & Mrs David Potter Bruce & Lizzie Powell Mark & Veronica Powell

BT Alex.Brown International Hays plc Wilde Sapte Barclays Private Banking

Catering & Allied Coutts & Co Biddle Denton Hall

Mr & Mrs Richard Priestley Mrs Barbara Rait Sir Peter & Lady Ramsbotham Mr Myrddin Rees MS FRCS Mr David Reid Scott Anonymous Mrs Eric Robinson Clare Rowland Mr & Mrs James Sabben-Clare Sir Timothy Sainsbury Mrs John Salkeld Lady Salomon Mr Richard Scopes The Countess of Selborne Mr & Mrs Mark Silver Mr Paul Skinner Mrs David Smith The Hon & Mrs Jeremy Soames Mr J G Stanford Mrs Donald Stearns Mr R Kirk Stephenson Mr & Mrs Richard H Sykes Mr Anthony John Thompson Professor & Mrs G M Tonge Adair Turner & Orna Ni-Chionna Mr & Mrs David Vaughan The Hon Mrs Lucy Vaughan Mrs Peter Vey Caroline Vroom Mr Hady Wakefield Lady Jane Wallop Dr & Mrs Oliver Wethered M Whalley & K Goldie-Morrison Mr F E B Witts Mr Charles Young

Corporate Founders Systems Union Group Ltd Ashe Park Mineral Water Baring Asset Management British Steel Distribution

Houston & Church Knight Frank (Winchester) Leopold de Rothschild Trust Well Marine Reinsurance Brokers

Athenians Mr & Mrs James Airy John & Jackie Alexander Mr & Mrs R Atkinson-Willes Miss Anne Beckwith-Smith Mr & Dr J Beechey Sheila Lady Bernard Mr Robert Bickerdike Mrs M R Bonsall Mrs Cherida Cannon Mr Patrick Carter Mr & Mrs Bernard Cazenove Mrs Justin Clark

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Mr & Mrs M Cooper-Mitchell Mr & Mrs R G Cottam Mr David Crowe Mr Nicholas de Zoete Ms K Deuss Gillian Devas Mr Anthony Doggart Robyn Durie Walter & Jane Eddlestone Stuart & Anne Fowler Archie & Henrietta Fraser Gen Sir David Fraser GCB OBE

Mr & Mrs Wyatt Gates Lt Col David R Gilbert His Honour Judge Martin Graham QC Mr Robert B Gray Mr & Mrs J C Green Mr John Hammond Mr & Mrs Peter Hobbs Mr & Mrs G Hollingbery Mr Charles Irby Mr & Mrs Malcolm Isaac Mr Barry Jackson

Mrs Julian Jeffs Mrs Lynette G Joly JP Mrs Z L Kelton Mr John Learmonth Mr Gerald Levin Mr & Mrs Mark Lomas Mr & Mrs David Maitland Anonymous Gordon & Julia Medcalf Lord Montagu of Beaulieu Mrs Jonathan Moore Mr Barry O’Brien

Mr Laurence O’Mara Mrs Deidre Pegg Miss Mahtab Pouria Mrs C H Powell Mrs Joan L Prior Mrs Thomas Redfern Mr John A Rickards Dr Janet Ritterman Mrs Martin St Quinton Mr Anthony Salz Anne Lady Scott Mr & Mrs Philip Snuggs

Mr David F M Stileman Mr & Mrs Ian Streat Mr R H Sutton Mr Peter Tilley The Hon Mrs W Tufnell K Sandberg & T Watkins Mr & Mrs T Wightman Andrew & Emma Wilson Olivia Winterton Dr Nicholas Wright Mr Tim Wright Mrs Paul Zisman

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La Traviata is the third production at Grange Park to have been generously supported by

The Christopher Ondaatje Foundation Previous productions supported by the Foundation 2001 I Capuleti e I Montecchi 2000 Eugene Onegin

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melodramma in three acts Giuseppe Verdi (1813 - 1901) to a libretto by Francesco Maria Piave after La Dame aux Camélias by Alexandre Dumas, fils Sung in Italian with surtitles by Jonathan Burton First performance Teatro la Fenice, Venice, March 6, 1853 First performance Her Majesty’s Theatre, London, 1856 Performances at The Grange June 13, 15, 21, 26, 29, July 3, 5, 10, 2002

La Traviata Mark Shanahan Conductor

Aidan Lang Director

Deirdre Clancy Designer

Chris Davey Lighting Designer

Ptolemy Christie Assistant Director

violetta valery

a courtesan

flora annina Violetta’s maid alfredo germont giorgio germont his father gastone a man about town baron douphol marchese d’obigny doctor grenvil giuseppe Violetta’s servant

the orchestra of grange park

Katarina Jovanovic Anthea Kempston Joanna Gamble Alan Oke George Mosley Kevin West Jozef Koc Kevin Sharp Ewan Taylor Hamish Brown

Leader Andrew Court

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La Traviata act one Violetta’s salon Among the guests at the festivities is Gaston who tells Violetta, a courtesan, that his friend Alfredo is seriously in love with her. She treats the matter with outward levity but is touched by Alfredo’s devotion.

The guests move towards another room where there is dancing but Violetta is seized with a coughing spasm. Alfredo has remained behind and protests his love for her. At first answering with banter, she becomes more serious as she realises his devotion is true. The guests all leave and Violetta is left alone, haunted by these new feelings.

act two Scene 1 A country house near Paris – some months later Alfredo and Violetta have deserted their Parisian social whirl for a more peaceful existence with one another. Alfredo sings of his joy in his life with Violetta. Annina, Violetta’s maid, tells him that, in order to pay the household expenses, Violetta has been selling her jewels. He leaves for Paris to raise money to reimburse her.

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Violetta receives a note from Flora inviting her to a party. She smiles at the absurdity of the idea that she should return, even for an evening, to her former life. An unexpected visitor is announced. The man who enters introduces himself as Alfredo’s father, Giorgio Germont. His aloof yet restrained manner fills Violetta with apprehension. Germont explains that Alfredo’s liaison with Violetta has blighted not only his own career but the marriage prospects of Alfredo’s younger sister.

Violetta is devastated at the thought of leaving Alfredo but decides she must make this sacrifice, aware that her unhappiness may aggravate her disease and hasten her death.

Violetta hands Annina a note accepting Flora’s invitation. Then she writes to Alfredo saying she has decided to return to her old life and will look to Baron Douphol to maintain her. Alfredo arrives back and tells Violetta that he is expecting a visit from his father who is attempting to dissuade him from pursuing the relationship with Violetta. Pretending that she leaves so as not to be present during the interview, she leaves.

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Alfredo is alone. Violetta has given her note to a messenger who now gives it to Alfredo. He begins to read it and is close to collapse when his father comes in to offer comfort but does not tell Alfredo of his own part in these dreadful events.

Alfredo finds Flora’s letter and concludes that Violetta will be at Flora’s party, where he will go to seek his revenge on her betrayal.

* dinner interval

(85 minutes) *

act two Scene 2 Flora’s party – the same evening The festivities are in full swing with exotic entertainment when Alfredo arrives, closely followed by Baron Douphol with Violetta on his arm. Alfredo is steadily winning at cards. ‘Unlucky in love, lucky in gambling!’ he exclaims. Violetta winces and the Baron, angered, ambles towards the gaming table to stake against Alfredo, who again wins.

Everyone retires to eat and for a moment the room is empty. Violetta has asked Alfredo to speak to her and she begs him to leave, fearing the Baron’s anger will damage Alfredo. He brushes aside her concern, saying she is really only concerned for the Baron. Violetta’s true feelings almost betray her but she remembers her promise to Germont and exclaims that she does indeed love the Baron.

Alfredo is furious and calls in the other guests to denounce Violetta. To culminate his humiliation of her, he throws in her face his winnings, in payment for their time together over the past months.

Germont arrives looking for his son.

He alone knows the real significance of the scene but, for the sake of his son and daughter, cannot disclose it. (facing page) Olympia by Edouard Manet (1832–1883) Musée d’Orsay, Paris © Bridgeman Art Library

Still Life with Oysters by Gustave Caillebotte (1848–1894) Josefowitz Collection

act three Violetta’s bedroom – some time later Violetta is very ill and, waking up confusedly, looks down into the street which is gay with carnival preparations. Dr Grenvil arrives and, to Violetta, cheerfully holds out hope of recovery, but to Annina confides that she has but a few hours to live.

Violetta has received a letter from Germont telling her that Alfredo now knows why Violetta really left. Alfredo will be visiting her as quickly as possible. Violetta has little hope that he will arrive in time. Outside she hears revellers. Annina has been out to distribute alms and returns excited – she has seen Alfredo. A moment later they are together and they share new dreams – they will leave Paris for some quiet retreat.

It is too late. Germont and Dr Grenvil have come but there is nothing to be done. The hand of death is upon her and she is finally at peace.

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Violetta

The last courtesan to have a heart

The inspiration for Violetta was actually Marie Duplessis, the heroine of Alexandre Dumas’ novel La Dame aux Camélias. Dumas, the third generation of one of the most colourful French families of the 19th century, based her on a tragic episode in his own life. Michael Fontes, senior master at Winchester College, sets the scene.

‘I don’t want to draw from this story the conclusion that all girls like Marguerite are capable of doing what she did: far from it, but I know that one did in her life experience a deep love, that she suffered for it, that she died because of it. I’ve told the reader what I have learnt. That was my duty.’

Alexandre Dumas, fils: end of the novel La Dame aux Camélias ‘Take my advice; marry a West Indian Negress.

They make the best wives.’ My pupils look sceptically at me, unsifted in such perilous circumstance, not sure whether I’m joking or not. To explain I usually mention Antoine-Alexandre Davy, Marquis de la Pailleterie, a Norman aristocrat of the ancien régime, who in the middle of the eighteenth century settled on his West Indian plantations and put the advice to practical test. He elevated Marie-Césette Dumas from the position of slave to wife and together they founded a bloodline of such vigour that several generations were necessary to dissipate the heady mix.

Their son Thomas-Alexandre took his mother’s surname and demonstrated the full force of the mélange: a devoted republican and a first-class soldier, he was raised in seven years from private to general, and was famous as probably the strongest man in Napoleon’s armies. He was the only dragoon able to ride into stables, put his arms up to the great beam of the roof and lift the horse off its feet between his knees. More surprising, though less spectacular, he liked to take four long infantry muskets, put a finger into the barrel of each, and hold them out at arm’s length for a minute or two. Once, during the Austrian campaign, finding some soldiers incapable of scaling a palisade, General Dumas dismounted, picked them up one by one and threw them bodily over the obstacle. On another occasion, seeing a soldier commit some breach of discipline, Dumas rode up to him, grabbed him by the collar, lifted him off his feet and, without bothering to lay him across

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the saddle, carried him away to the guard room. At the battle of Botzen the French were, for a time, heavily outnumbered and driven back, but Dumas killed ‘many of the enemy’ in close combat and then proceeded to hold a bridge by himself, against a whole squadron of Austrian cavalry. Always quick to throw himself into violent action, Dumas, the ‘Black Devil’, was equally alert to defend his honour: hearing that he had been reported by a brother officer as having remained ‘in observation’ when Wurmser made his final attempt to break out of Mantua, Dumas made nine officers of the 20th Dragoons certify in writing that he had had one horse killed under him in the action and another buried by a shell.

Dumas ended his letter to Napoleon on the subject with the hope that the author of the false report would now ‘make caca in his breeches’.

The general’s son Alexandre, author of The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, generally known as Alexandre Dumas père, inherited most of his father’s incredible energy and zest for life; the Dumas blood was little mitigated in passing via his French mother. His main hobbies were women, entertaining and all aspects of gastronomy – his Grand Dictionnaire de la Cuisine was published three years after his death. In his preface to this delicious anthology, Dumas talks interestingly about appetite: ‘From birth, men receive orders at least three times a day from their stomachs to eat, to replenish the energies sapped by work or, more often even, by laziness.’ Nobody could have called Dumas lazy; contemporaries wondered how, amid so much dissipation, travel, rebellious activity of one kind or another – buying rifles for Garibaldi, for instance – and eating, he could find time to read voraciously and, above all, to write. He had great success at the time with his plays, of which the best known is probably La Tour de Nesle, considered the greatest masterpiece of French melodrama. But his novels have brought him lasting fame.

Many first came out serialised in newspapers. He was,

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at one stage, contracted to write 220,000 lines a year for La Presse and Le Constitutionel. He met the obligation by organising a sort of novel factory, known ironically as Dumas & Co – John Ireland said enviously that Britten had only to write something and Boosey would Hawke it – which produced 250 novels bearing his name. Dumas would write a lot of the dialogue, in which he excelled, and the chapter endings, deliberately tantalising his readers to ensure they came back for more; most of the rest he left to hacks, some of whom had gifts beyond those suggested by that label. At the height of his fame, Dumas had 73 assistants, of whom the most celebrated is probably the history teacher August Maquet.

Alexandre Dumas, the younger by Georges Clairin (1843-1919) © Bridgeman Art Library

The novels skilfully blend fiction and fact. They deal with well known historical incidents or rumours, usually from the seventeenth century, like the story of The Man in the Iron Mask, and the characters were often based on historical personages: D’Artagnan was Louis XIV’s trusted chief musketeer, effectively chief of Louis’ personal police. There were musketeers called Aramis and Athos, but their characters and exploits were inventions of Dumas; people think he may have based aspects of the mighty Porthos on his own father, the giant mulatto general. The pace is terrific and the tone racy. Here is a description of hashish tasting from The Count of Monte Cristo:

‘Diable!’ he said, tasting the divine preserve. ‘I don’t know if the effect will be as agreeable as you describe, but the stuff isn’t as palatable as you led me to expect.’

‘You’ve got to give yourself time to get used to it.

Remember the first time you tasted oysters, tea, beer, truffles, and lots of other things you now adore? Did you like them when you first tried them? Have you wondered why the Romans stuffed their pheasants with asafetida, or how the Chinese came to eat swallows’ nests? No? Well it’s the same with hashish; persist for a week and nothing in the world will seem to equal its delicacy of flavour. Yet now you think it flat and disagreeable. Let’s go next door, where you’re staying, and Ali will bring us coffee and pipes.’

Trust Dumas to know that hashish is an acquired taste and that the Romans stuffed their pheasants with asafetida. In the early stages of cooking it fully justifies its name. I remember the first time I used some in a curry. I mentioned the dreadful smell – somewhere between Turkish drains and badger dung – to one of my dinner guests, Brian O’Rorke, who used to run a fine restaurant in Alresford, and whose understatements I liked to collect. ‘Yes,’ he agreed dryly; ‘it does smell most unpromising.’ You have to persevere, even if you fear your cat will never come into the kitchen again: I know people who don’t think it’s worth the bother even if you do.

When he wasn’t speculating about how people discovered that coxcombs, sturgeon’s roe and snails were good to eat, Dumas père was developing a reputation as one of history’s great spendthrifts. He married his mistress, Ida Ferrier, but soon separated from her after spending all her money; he built the fantastic Chateau de Monte Cristo at Port Marly, just south of St-Germain-en-Laye. In 1851 he had to flee to Brussels to escape his creditors. He spent four years in Naples as Garibaldi’s ‘Chief of excavations and Keeper of the city museums’. After his return to France his debts continued to increase but this didn’t inhibit his lifestyle. He was known as the King of Paris, though he was too wild and unprincipled to be accepted in respectable circles, and he continued to publish novels and memoirs and to run newspapers, until his death from a stroke at his son’s house near Dieppe in 1870, aged 68.

Dumas does not seem to have encountered racial prejudice and did not think of himself, despite his appearance, as anything other than French. Several of the novels treat racism and colonialism, however, and he

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has always been popular among black Americans, partly, perhaps, because the story of the falsely imprisoned Edmond Dantès in the Count of Monte Cristo can be seen as a parable of the emancipation of the slaves. More explicitly in Georges, a short novel of 1843, the main protagonist is a half-French mulatto, like the giant general, who comes back to Mauritius after a French education to avenge himself for the mistreatment he received in his youth.

Dumas was not much given to moralising and The Three Musketeers has often caused problems for film-makers because aspects of the story fall foul of Hollywood’s production code: D’Artagnan, in so many ways admirable and a proper exemplar for clean living American youth, is in love with a married woman, Constance, and simultaneously conducting an affair with Milady de Winter, Athos’s wife, whose maid, Kitty, is also the subject of his amorous interest.

The moralist of the family is our man, the respectable Dumas, the author of La Dame aux Camélias, Alexandre Dumas fils. Born in 1824, he was the illegitimate son of Dumas and a mistress, Marie-Catherine Labay, a Parisian dressmaker. He spent an unhappy childhood, teased about his illegitimacy, and torn between his parents. He was not a man to bear his problems lightly, unlike an old music master of ours, Sydney Watson. Sydney had a very bad stammer which he turned into a social strength. He had been examining; the boys would run up to him. ‘Doctor Watson, how’ve we done? How’ve we done?’ Sydney would look very severe. ‘You’ve fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fapassed,’ he’d say and go off smiling. Sydney had been a parachutist during the war and was about eight feet tall. He went on to be Master of Music at Eton where, an Eton beak told me, during a Field Day in the Corps they decided to dress him up as a nun and have him parachute into the middle of the exercise. It sounds the most natural thing in the world to do now, but at the time, my informant tells me, they were pretty struck with the idea. The boys were warned to expect and to arrest infiltrators. Sydney came down from a clear sky into some anonymous part of Aldershot, rolled over a few times, hid his parachute under a juniper bush and looked about him.

The boys were moved, no doubt, by the sight of a very tall nun floating down by parachute, but not misled. They rushed out of the trees, stuck their rifles into Sydney and said, ‘Hands up! You’re Doctor Watson.’

Sydney wasn’t at all thrown by this; he stood up very straight, tidied his habit and coif, and said: ‘awah-awah-awah-awah-awah . . . awah-tever makes you think that?’

The youngest Dumas was not as blithe as Sydney. He greatly admired his father’s books, but deplored his way of life and spendthrift habits, though he had trouble himself in his early years keeping out of debt and supporting his destitute mother. As a writer he specialised in stories about social problems, problems of legitimacy, child-mothers, prostitution, adultery and divorce. You sense in Traviata his interest in the role of women and the importance of the family and of respectability. Dumas had felt profoundly his lack of status as an ‘enfant naturel’ –

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E G Waterhouse Joan Trehane Casa Rosa Laura Boscawen Water Lily Jill Totty Saint Ewe Camellia Freedom Bell Garden Glory Anticipation Brigadoon Francis Hanger Senorita Hope Blue Danube Charles Colbert Galaxie Bow Bells Mirage Wilber Foss

photo:© Derek St Romaine

Peter McArthur, the gardener for the new Orangery at The Grange, gives an account in 1826 of some of Alexander Baring’s plants “In the vestibule [the portico] stand plants in boxes or pots; being fine specimens or fine flowering plants of orange trees, camellias (japonica and sasanqua), proteas, chines magnolias, Buonapartea juncea, croweas, gardenias and Erythrina cristagalli.”

The Gardener’s Magazine 1826

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he wasn’t recognised by his parents until the age of seven. His titles often reveal this sensitivity: A Prodigal Father, A Natural Son. You get the impression that the whole of the poor chap’s autobiography was enacted on the stage.

La Dame aux Camélias was an intensely personal story for Dumas. He had met Marie, the original of Marguerite Gautier and hence of Violetta, at his father’s house: one rumour has it that she had been Dumas père’s mistress too. She was the daughter of a Norman farmer, and her real name was Alphonsine Plessis. Dumas was twenty and Marie only six months older. She was disturbingly beautiful and charming and amusing; she loved gambling and horseracing.

She was already unwell and Dumas begged her to take things easier. The aria Sempre Libera could be based on her response: ‘If I do, I shall die. Only a life of excitement can keep me alive.’

Their passionate affair lasted only a few weeks.

They broke up in less than a year. ‘I am not rich enough to love you as you would like, and not poor enough to be loved as you would want’ he wrote, unforgivably.

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Dumas went to Spain and North Africa, then changed his mind, and wrote to Marie begging her to take him back. When he returned to Paris he learnt she had died the previous week.

He wrote the novel on which he was to base his play in three weeks, in a fit of grief and remorse. The play, which was to be the greatest success in the Paris theatre in the nineteenth century, took him eight days.

Verdi was in Paris at the time of the first performance in February 1852. The disastrous opening night of Traviata at the Fenice was in March 1853. Verdi and Piave were no slouches either.

Dumas gave his hero Armand Duval – Alfredo in the opera – his own initials. Marie Duplessis he changed to Marguerite Gautier. The camellias were her favourite flower – she says so in the first act: she will never accept any other. Dumas ends his novel admitting that the story is mostly true. ‘Not being old enough to invent things, I make do with recounting . . .’

‘I assure the reader that this story is true and all the people, except the heroine, are still alive.’

Little is so revealing or interesting about the

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character of Violetta as Dumas own description of Marie: ‘The person who was the model for the heroine of La Dame aux Camélias was called Alphonsine Plessis, which she turned into the finer sounding and more distinguished Marie Duplessis. She was tall, very slim, with black hair, pink and white complexion, long enamelled eyes like a Japanese girl, but lively and delicate, cherry lips and the most beautiful teeth in the world; she was like a Saxe figurine. In 1844, when I saw her for the first time, she was in the first flush of her beauty. She died in 1847 of a lung disorder at the age of twenty-three’ ‘She was one of the last and only courtesans to have a heart. That must be why she died so young. She was not short of intelligence or inclination to take an interest in other people. She died poor in a sumptuous house, which was already in the hands of her creditors.

She possessed natural distinction, dressed tastefully, held herself gracefully, almost with nobility. She was sometimes taken for a woman of the world; today people would certainly make that mistake. She was a farmer’s daughter. Théophile Gautier wrote a few lines as a funeral ode for her, through which we saw float away into the blue that friendly little spirit which should, with a few others, immortalise the sin of love.’

‘Marie Duplessis didn’t have all the adventures which I give to Marguerite Gautier, but she might well have done. If she gave up nothing for Armand, that was because he wanted it that way. To her great regret she could only take a part in the first and second acts of the play. She started them over and over again, like Penelope with her tapestry: only in Marie’s case it was the day which undid her work of the night. She was never known, during her life, as the Lady of the Camellias. The soubriquet I gave Marguerite was pure invention. However it came to Marie Duplessis on the rebound, when the novel was published, about a year after her death. If in Montmartre cemetery you ask to see the tomb of the Lady of the Camellias, the caretaker will show you a small square monument, and underneath the name Alphonsine Plessis you will see a little crown of artificial white camellias sealed into the marble. It has its own story now, that tomb. Art is divine: it can create or bring back to life . . .’

Michael Fontes

the orchestra of grange park violin 1

violin 2

viola

cello

double bass flute oboe clarinet bassoon horn

trumpet trombone timpani & percussion orchestra manager

Andrew Court Matthew Fairman Nicolette Brown Megan Pound Carole Howat Jo West Steve Bingham Bridget Davey Jayne Spencer Zoe French Jenny Gibbs Vernon Dean Fiona Chesterman Becky Jones Chris Koh Nicki Bradford Jeff Moore Stephen Wright Angela Bonetti Martin Fenn John Rayson Justin Wood Lionel Handy Jo Easthope Natalie Rosario Andrew Fuller Matthew Forbes Mark Thistlewood Caroline Harding Christine Messiter Janna Hueneke Andrew Knights Judith Allen Mark Simmons Mark Lacey Julia Staniforth Rebecca Menday Richard Berry Peter Merry Tim Ball Miles Hewitt Steven Stewart Clare Duncan Rob Workman Mark Taylor Joanne May Mark Lacey

(facing page) Chemin montant by Gustave Caillebotte (1848–1894)

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The Studs Trust is pleased to be supporting Grange Park Opera at this important stage in its development

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a musical comedy in two acts Music and lyrics Cole Porter (1891 - 1964) Original book by Guy Bolton and P G Wodehouse, revised by Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse First performance Colonial Theatre, Boston November 5, 1934 First performance in England Palace Theatre, London, June 14, 1935 Performances at The Grange June 14, 16, 22, 27, July 4, 7, 9, 12, 2002

Majella Cullagh

Anything Goes

Fiona Campbell Sarah Pring Kathleen Wilkinson Jeffrey Lloyd-Roberts

Nick Davies Conductor

David Pountney Director

Johann Engels Designer

Sue Wilmington Costume Designer

Chris Davey Lighting Designer

Craig Revel-Horwood Choreographer

reno sweeney hope harcourt evangeline harcourt lord evelyn oakleigh elisha whitney billy crocker moonface martin erma a gangster’s moll Anthea Kempston Hamish Brown Trevor Conner Gordon Adams Ewan Taylor Michael Broughton, Lee Marriner Chris Jarvis

by arrangement with the Cole Porter Foundation orchestrations by John McGlinn

Richard Barrowclough, Jozef Koc,

Robert Poulton Kim Criswell Harry Brett-Jones Deborah Dutcher Carl Gombrich Linda Marlowe Harry Nicoll Simon Green Graham Wili Simon Clark Brindley Sherratt Graham Bickley John Guerrasio Tanya Moodie

purser captain barman luke john reporters photographer sailors

Andres Salazar, Kevin Sharp, Lisa Donmall, Tiffany Graves, Carly Hainsby

angels

Helen Harper, Summer Strallen

the orchestra of grange park

Leader Andrew 79 Court

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Anything goes – synopsis (sort of) ELISHA WHITNEY a gung-ho Yale businessman on his way to the Henley Regatta has left his office in the charge of . . .

BILLY who has instead stowed away on the liner to pursue the love of his life

Entertainment on board will be provided by the evangelist soul-saver

RENO and her equally dubious ANGELS

LUKE & JOHN

a pair of card-playing Chinese converts QUITE

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To suggest that Anything Goes possessed anything so mundane as a plot would be a grave insult to its exuberant and zany folly. The most concise summary might therefore be:

collect together the most improbable selection of characters, put them all on board a transatlantic liner and

Anything goes !

HOPE HARCOURT who is travelling with her ambitious mother

EVANGELINE whose plan to rescue her finances by marrying Hope off to an effete English aristocrat

LORD EVELYN

is about to come to fruition and the passenger list is given a little low-life spice by the presence of

THE REVEREND MOON in reality a mildly notorious gangster travelling incognito with the fragrant

ERMA a gangster’s moll with an insatiable appetite for seamen

NATURALLY MAKE UP THE PARTY AT WHICH

Anything goes

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Some words about Anything Goes When Anything Goes opened in New York in 1934, it was an immense success, marking the end of the Great Depression and becoming the “bright and cheerful embodiment” of the Roosevelt recovery. It was the brainchild of a brilliant but almost bankrupt Broadway producer, Vinton Freedland, who commissioned Guy Bolton and P G Wodehouse to write the script. Following the Morro Castle cruise ship disaster off New Jersey only two months before it was due to open, it had to be completely rewritten

by Howard Lindsay and Russel Cruise – the team that went on to write The Sound of Music in 1959.

Miles Kreuger tells the story.

Wall st lays an egg screamed the headlines of Variety, the Broadway Bible, on October 30, 1929.

With that colourful show business jargon, the deepest economic Depression in history was heralded. As banks began to fail, as companies went out of business, as belts tightened and bread lines lengthened, the box-office receipts on Broadway began to shrivel. The 1929-1930 season was damaged more by competition from talking pictures than by the Depression itself, but, by the 1930-1931 season, 77% of all Broadway shows were financial failures. In the 1931-1932 season, the percentage jumped to 83%.

It was during that last season that Kaufman and Ryskind wrote their satire on the federal government, Of Thee I Sing (1931), with a score by the Gershwin brothers. The show perfectly reflected the public’s feeling that their leaders in Washington were either all crooks or incompetent boobs or both.

With the inauguration of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1933, a new wave of optimism spread throughout the country. There were sweeping reforms in banking, and the New Deal and National Recovery Act (with its symbolic blue eagle) gave hope and employment to millions. Perhaps best of all, the crime-infested ignoble experiment, Prohibition, came to a thudding conclusion. Almost overnight, Manhattan burst back to life with a passion for play unequaled before or since. On Broadway, there were still comparatively few hits, but the shows that did find a public ran far longer than those of recent seasons.

There was, however, a phenomenal blossoming of late-night restaurants and clubs for song and dance.

One of the most fashionable was the Caprice Room of the Hotel Weylin, at Madison Avenue and 54th Street, so popular in fact that an exact replica of the room was created on the stage of the Alvin Theatre as the opening scent of Anything Goes.

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If one can generalize a bit and say that Of Thee I Sing is the one Broadway musical that completely captures the cynicism of the Hoover Depression, then Anything Goes is the bright and cheerful embodiment of the Roosevelt recovery.

With some of the smartest Broadway musical comedies of the decade under their collaborative belt – Lady Be Good! (1924), Tip-Toes (1925), Oh Kay! (1926) and Funny Face (1927) – all with scores by the Gershwins – Freedley, and his partner Alexander Aarons, opened their new Alvin Theatre on Broadway in 1927. It was a brilliant success but it was the unexpected failure of Pardon My English, an elaborate production with a fine Gershwin score, that led to the dissolution of this wondrously imaginative partnership. Like a phoenix rising out of the ashes of failure, Anything Goes proved to be the inevitable success born from that flop of two seasons earlier.

During the summer of 1933, Freedley, enmeshed in debt, decided to flee his creditors. He took his wife Mary on a fruit boat to Panama, en route to the tiny Caribbean island of Tobago, where he spent four or five months restoring his economic stability and began to conceive his next project: a musical comedy about a group of eccentric characters aboard a cruise ship bound for England.

Freedley envisioned an intimate production along the lines of the many shows written for the Princess Theatre, a tiny 299-seat playhouse, with music, book and lyrics generally by Jerome Kern, Guy Bolton and P.G. Wodehouse. Both Bolton and Wodehouse were living abroad, the former in London, the latter in France, to avoid crushing tax problems. Kern was composing exclusively with Otto Harvach and Oscar Hammerstein II; and Gershwin, a possible substitute as composer, was busily preparing an operatic adaptation of the play Porgy. Freedley had always wanted to

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do a show with Cole Porter, but, as he later recalled, “Aarons thought Cole was old hat – even before he was new hat.”

When mounting an original story, it was customary in the 1930’s for a producer to hire popular stars and then fashion a vehicle to suit their talents.

Freedley at once decided he wanted the comedy team of William Gaxton and Victor Moore, fresh from their triumph in Of Thee I Sing, and that rising young lady with the powerful pipes, Ethel Merman, who had made her Broadway bow in Girl Crazy. At that moment, Merman was in Hollywood and Gaxton and Moore were appearing in Let ‘em Eat Cake.

Undeterred, Freedley contacted the three writers abroad and told them of his plans. On May 4, 1934 Freedley, confined to a wheelchair (doctors were unable to determine if he had had a heart attack or was suffering from heat stroke), was pushed up the gangplank aboard the Majestic and set sail for London to confer with his authors. While in London, he hired Howard Lindsay to direct his new show. It was necessary for Freedley to corral his three new writers at one place. Bolton did not want to travel to Paris, where Wodehouse was conferring with Lindsay, nor would Wodehouse go to London. Porter was touring the Rhine. A compromise was struck, when the group agreed to meet at the Frence coastal community, Le Touquet-Paris Plage.

With Bolton as the primary author and Wodehouse adding his whimsical touches throughout, an outline for a show to be called Hard To Get was delivered to Porter, who, a few weeks later, turned up at Freedley’s hotel with a sheaf of song sheets. Freedley was entranced by the selections and returned with confidence to New York. By mid-July the Wodehouses decided to make Le Touquet their permanent home and, while it was being redecorated, stayed at the Royal Picardy Hotel, where Hard To Get was assuming final form.

On August 15, Freedley received the completed Bolton-Wodehouse manuscript: and the following day Porter returned to America on the Ile de France with the score. It was announced that rehearsals would begin September 10 and that Gaxton and Moore were signed. Ethel Merman would join them if motion picture contracts permitted.

Like the plot of the show itself, what seemed like

The brand new Ile de France preparing to sail from New York 1927

smooth sailing suddenly hit a reef. The script called for Barbara Frisbee to sail for London with her British fiancé Eric Oakleigh. Her father wants to prevent the marriage and tells his former employee Jimmy Crocker that, if he sails and breaks up the wedding, he will be rehired. On the ship, Jimmy meets Moon, Public Enemy no 13, a nightclub singer Jenny (who loves Jimmy) and Elmer Purkis, a veteran screenwriter. Purkis helps Jimmy discredit Eric by thinking up plot devices from old movies. A fake bomb is created from a barbell, and, while Jenny is singing, it is rolled out before the terrified passengers.

Instead of Jimmy grabbing it and becoming a hero to Barbara, Eric swiftly tosses it overboard. In Act Two, the entire ship is gripped with terror that more danger lies ahead, a mood that Jenny attempts to dispel with her big revival number.

Freedley was fearful that the rather derisive attitude toward Hollywood might ruin chances of a film sale, and he was torn between rejecting it and

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having Lindsay attempt an heroic salvation. Lindsay agreed to rewrite the work but felt that it was necessary to have a collaborator, as rehearsals were about to begin in just a few days.

With grim irony, an event took place on September 8 that required the scrapping of the entire Bolton-Wodehouse story. On that balmy summer afternoon, bathers at Asbury Park, New Jersey, looked out to sea in horror, as the cruise ship SS Morro Castle, returning from Havana, suddenly burst into flame before their eyes. With astonishing speed, the fire raced throughout the length of the ship. Although the fatality counts vary, somewhere between 125 and 180 people died. The burned vessel itself was wafted onto the shore, its bow firmly set in the sand. As thousands of visitors came to take pictures (and often souvenir pieces), many small businesses were saved from bankruptcy; and the city council actually considered keeping the scorched hulk on the beach as a permanent tourist attraction until local women’s clubs demanded its removal. Like the burning of the dirigible Hindenburg three years later in nearby Lakehurst, New Jersey, the Morro Castle fire is remembered as one of the great disasters of the decade.

Walking passengers’ dogs. Until the 1920’s, pets were cared for by the ship’s butcher, but from then on were handed over to “specialists”. On the Ile de France, there was both a lamppost for les chiens du boulevard and an American-style fire hydrant.

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If there had been any doubt earlier, it was now apparent that the musical had to be rewritten totally to remove even the faintest suggestion of an explosion at sea. Rehearsals, set to start only two days later, were postponed, while Freedley began in earnest to suggest possible collaborators to Lindsay.

Russel Crouse ran two humour columns in the New York Post. A small, gentle man of boundless goodwill and a gift for delectable puns, Crouse heard at a weekend party on Long Island that Freedley was looking for a writing partner for Howard Lindsay.

Together, Lindsay and Crouse would write scripts for seven musicals including The Sound of Music (1959). The only caution about their re-write of Anything Goes was that it had to take place aboard a luxury liner, because Donald Oenslager’s streamlined nautical sets had already been built at Bernie McDonald’s famous scene shop.

For their stars, William Gaxton and Victor Moore, they fashioned the roles of Billy Crocker and Moon-Face Mooney. Both characters were in the original script, but much of their business and almost all their dialogue were written by Lindsay and Crouse.

While lunching at the Algonquin Hotel, Lindsay and Crouse mistook a well-known nightclub singer for the nototious lady evangelist Aimee Semple McPherson. Thus was born the role of Reno Sweeney, an evangelist-turned-belter, fashioned for Ethel Merman. Merman was not actually signed until September 26, 1934 and it was not until October 1 that the final title Anything Goes (the inspiration of William Gaxton) was announced.

What had been envisioned by Freedley as an intimate, little show had evolved into a production with seven different sets mounted on a turntable, 29 speaking parts, three different male quartets, a small on-stage orchestra to back up “Blow, Gabriel, Blow,” seventeen chorus girls as Reno’s Angels, and a bevy of assorted beauties as passengers. So much for intimacy!

Perhaps because so little of the script was actually written at the outset of rehearsals, very little rewriting had to be done right through the Broadway opening.

One song, “Thank You So Much, Mrs LowsboroughGoodby,” never even survived to rehearsals, while just three songs were dropped during rehearsals. Ethel Merman refused to sing “Kate the Great” because of its racy lyrics. “Easy to Love” was not in Gaxton’s limited

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vocal range and was replaced by “All through the night.” Porter later used “Easy to Love” in the MGM film Born to Dance (1936).

Following the brilliant opening night, the chorus routine, “There’s No Cure Like Travel”, was shortened to “Bon Voyage”. “What a Joy to be Young” was deleted and “Buddy Beware” was replaced a few weeks after the Broadway opening by a reprise of “I get a Kick Out of You”.

One other involuntary change took place.

Opening night in Boston, a well-dressed young man asked to see the general manager Louis Loewenstein, and gave him the ominous message that if the Victor Moore character was called Moon Face Mooney, Loewenstein would find himself in serious trouble.

Frightened, Freedley allowed a change. Lindsay and Crouse instructed the cast that hereafter Moore was to be addressed as Moon Face Martin. Later, Damon Runyon, the Bard of Times Square, told Crouse that there was a real Mooney, an eccentric mobster from New Jersey, and his fellow gangsters, who enjoyed kidding him, had gotten him fuming over the use of his name in a humorous context.

It was generally agreed that the New York opening at the Alvin on November 21, 1934 was the most glamorous that Broadway had seen since the beginning of the Depression. There was rapturous praise for cast, score and script alike. An immense success, Anything Goes remained a “hot ticket” until July 1935, when Merman left the cast to make a film for Sam Goldwyn. The show moved theatres and ran 415 performances.

Ethel Merman repeated the role of Reno in the 1936 Paramount film version with Bing Crosby (Billy), Charlie Rugges (Moon) and Ida Lupino (Hope). Only four Porter songs were retained with a number of interpolations for Crosby to croon.

Alas, Anything Goes is a brilliant example of a kind of musical that Broadway will probably never again experience: an original story fashioned expressly for the talents of great stage stars, with songs tailored just for their personal styles. While one might suspect that such a star vehicle will in time become unplayable when those stars are no longer available, Anything Goes has proved to be the most frequently revived musical of the 1930’s.

The Lindsay and Crouse script (with a few

The Queen Mary arriving in New York in May 1936

vestigial lines remaining by Bolton and Wodehouse) is a model of simplicity. Each major character has a clearcut motivation sufficient to sustain action throughout the entire evening, yet general enough to allow for the playful insertion of comic scenes and a cascade of show-stopping songs. It is not unlike the text of a Commedia dell’Arte play with openings for improvisation.

Cole Porter once confided in me that he wanted no opening chorus, a standard convention of the time, and insisted upon placing the show’s biggest hit, “I Get a Kick Out of You”, within the first five minutes of the first scene. It seems that his society friends thought it was amusing to drift into the theatre fifteen or twenty minutes after the curtain had gone up, so that all their friends could observe what they were wearing. Because he regarded such behaviour as rude to both audience and the actors alike, he warned friends for weeks before the opening that they had better arrive on time or they would miss the big song: with a wry smirk, he added that they never forgave him. © 1989 Miles Kreuger

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You’re Mahatma Gandhi, Napoleon Brandy – you’re MickeyMouse During the Depression, many families could barely afford housing and food. Theatre was a luxury affordable to just the employed, the wealthy and the mobsters. Because Broadway musicals were no longer being aimed at the general public, but rather a more constricted group of cognoscenti, who went to all the same night spots, read the same newspaper columns and spent weekends at the same estates, everyone in the audience was swift to pick up even the most obscure references in all the lyrics.

No one catered to this phenomenon with as much unbridled glee as did Cole Porter, who delighted in dropping the names of all his friends. His lyrics during the early 1930’s read like a Who’s Who and What’s What of the era.

Opening night audiences of the time played the game and loved catching and devouring every topical tid bit tossed by the master. It was an age in which all gentlemen attending a Broadway opening did so in top hat, white tie and tails, while all the women were perfectly pedicured, if not pedigreed.

The following disparate assemblage of information was made possible through the assistance of historian Dr Gerald Turgow, and Hollywood Book City’s Alan Siegel, whose giant book store was used as a temporary reference library.

you’re the top • “Bendel bonnet” – One can still purchase a Bendel bonnet at Henri Bendel, 10 West 57th Street, then as now a fashionable ladies’ speciality shop • “Mickey Mouse” – Mickey was the world’s most popular movie star during the 1930’s • “Vincent Youmans” – Born the day after George Gershwin, Youmans (1898–1946) was the brilliant melodist of “Time on My Hands”, “Without a Song”, “Tea for Two”, “I Want to be Happy”, “Hallelujah”, “Orchids in the Moonlight” and countless other hits • “Mahatma Gandhi” (1869–1948) – Hindu nationalist who fought British rule of India with “passive resistance”. Famed in 1934 for hunger strikes and his distinctive sartorial style • “Napoleon Brandy” – Once brandy is bottled,

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it ceases to improve; and any brandy left in a cask since the days of Napoleon would have evaporated long ago So much for the myth of old brandy!

• “National Gall’ry” – London’s National Gallery on Trafalgar Square was founded in 1824 [and built by the architect of The Grange, William Wilkins] • “Garbo’s sal’ry” – In 1933, Greta Garbo’s salary was alleged to be $10,000 a week. A quart of milk cost a dime • “cellophane” – A transparent, flexible film used largely in packaging, cellophane was invented in 1908 by the Swiss chemist Jacques Edwin Brandenberger. American rights were purchased in 1923 by E I duPont. Successfully waterproofed in 1927, it was hailed as the miracle wrapping of the age and helped to promote the self–service industry. In 1934, the sets and costumes for the Broadway production of Virgil Thomson and Gertrude Stein’s Four Saints in Three Acts were made of cellophane • “the time of the Derby winner” – Founded in 1780, and named after the Twelfth Earl of Derby, this race for three-year-olds at Epsom Downs is probably the world’s most celebrated horse race. In 1934, the course was run in two minutes, 34 seconds by Windsor Lad • “Ritz hot toddy” – The fabled Ritz hotel in Paris was opened by César Ritz in June 1898. Cole Porter loved to write lyrics at its popular bar, where, on a chilly night, he no doubt warmed himself with Ritz hot toddy: a heated mug of whisky, flavored with citrus fruits and spices. The word “toddy” comes from the Hindi “tari” which means fermented or fresh sap of a palm tree • “Brewster body” – One of America’s most beautiful cars, the Brewster was noted for its heart–shaped grille, flared fenders and split bumpers • “Nathan panning” – Author and theatre critic, George Jean Nathan (1882–1958) was the darling of the intellectuals, championed Eugene O’Neill, and often flailed his flamboyant wit at defenseless actors and playwrights • “Bishop Manning” – Bishop William Thomas Manning (1866–1949) was the Episcopal Bishop of New York, where he devoted most of his life to building and completing the Cathedral of St John the Divine • “broccoli” – A green vegetable of the mustard family, broccoli spread from its native Italy to France and England

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early in the 18th century, and later that century to Williamsburg, Virginia. It became an American culinary craze, however, during the 1920’s • “night at Coney” – The world’s most famous amusement resort, located in Brooklyn and facing the Atlantic Ocean, Coney Island in the late 19th century featured elegant vacation hotels and restaurants. By the 1930’s it had evolved into a garish and tawdry oasis for city dwellers • “Irene Bordoni” – (1895–1953) This charming Gallic Broadway star with flashing eyes was the wife of producer E Ray Goetz, an old friend of Porter. In 1928, she starred in the musical Paris and introduced Porter’s “Let’s Do It” • “blop” – If Porter’s superlatives are the “top”, one can only imagine how he regarded the “blop” • “hot tamale” – Mexican delicacy • “Ovaltine” – This popular malted cereal drink was launched in Berne, Switzerland, by Dr George Wander and introduced to America in 1904. Originally called Ovomaltine, the name was later shortened for America and Britain. On April 6, 1931, Ovaltine inaugurated Little Orphan Annie, based on the famous comic strip, the first, regular children’s radio series. Every child in America had or longed for an Ovaltine shake–up mug, a decoder, or some other premium offered by the program • “dam at Boulder” – The highest concrete arched dam in America, it was named for Republican President Hoover.

Construction began in 1931. In 1933, with the election of Democrat Roosevelt, the name was changed to Boulder Dam. Its original name, Hoover Dam, was restored in 1947 with a new Republican majority in Congress • “Mae West’s shoulder” – She had two – both very attractive • “G.O.P” – The Republican party was formed in 1854, largely to prevent the extension of slavery into the new western territories and states. Its first nominee for President lost in 1856. The Republicans had better luck with Abraham Lincoln in 1860. In time, this grand new party became known as the Grand Old Party, or G.O.P. • “Arrow collar” – The Arrow Collar man was born in 1905, when illustrator Joseph Christian Leyendecker (1874–1951) was asked by Cluett, Peabody & Co to create an advertising campaign for Arrow-brand detachable shirt collars. The aloof, devastatingly handsome Arrow shirt man became the object of near fanatical adoration and actually received thousands of fan letters, sending the sales

of Arrow shirts and collars soaring • “Coolidge dollar” – A term synonymous with pre– Depression prosperity. Ironically for those who did have money during the Depression, the 1934 dollar was worth far more because prices had plummeted in these lean years • “O’Neill drama” – Eugene O’Neill (1888–1953) was America’s pre–eminent playwright during the 1920’s, but his vogue proved short–lived and ended in 1933 with Ah, Wilderness! Following Porter’s 1934 reference, O’Neill had no new play on Broadway for a dozen more years • “Whistler’s mama” – The celebrated portrait painted by James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834–1903) is officially entitled Arrangement in Black and Gray: The Artist’s Mother • “Camembert” – A popular soft cheese named after a village in Normandy, Camembert has been with us since the 12th century. No wonder it smells so bad • “the nose on the great Durante” – Jimmy Durante (1893–1980), the beloved comedian and ragtime pianist, and known for his prominent schnozzola, possessed the most celebrated theatrical nose since Cyrano • “Whitney Stable” – The familiar candy-striped black and cherry colours of the Whitney stables heralded the largest (and one of the oldest) string of horses in America • “Saks’s” – Andrew Saks opened his first New York store at Herald Square in 1902. His son Horace took over in 1912 and spent the following decade making Saks synonymous with stylish, gracious living. In 1923, Horace sold the store to his friend and business rival Bernard Gimbel for $8,000,000 in Gimbels stock. On September 15, 1924, Gimbel opened Saks Fifth Avenue, its name a shrewd combination of a fashionable emporium and a fashionable street; a name now renowned around the globe • “Drumstick Lipstick” – Not even Robert Salvatore, the resident expert of Hollywood’s Max Factor Beauty Museum, knows the meaning of this enigmatic phrase. Perhaps, like the identity of the killer in Charles Dickens’ The Mystery of Edwin Drood, it is lost to the ages • “Irish Svipstick” – In 1930, the Irish government approved a lottery as a means to raise funds for hospitals, mental institutions and homes for the poor and aged. The Irish Hospitals Sweepstakes swiftly became the largest international lottery, with most of the money coming from the United States, where tickets were sold illegally • “Waldorf salad” – Its name derived from the first Waldorf

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Astoria Hotel; the salad was created by maître d’hôtel Oscar Tschirky. In 1896, The Cook Book by Oscar of the Waldorf called for only apples, celery and mayonnaise, served on a bed of lettuce. Chopped walnuts or pecans were added during the next two decades • “Berlin ballad” – Of his approximately 850 published songs, Irving Berlin regarded roughly 150 as ballads • “Mrs Astor” – In 1914, the former Helen Dinsmore Huntington (1893–1976) of Rhinebeck, New York, married her neighbor Vincent Astor, whom she later divorced in 1940. In 1934, she continued her philanthropic activities with donations to the New York Philharmonic, Metropolitan Opera and New York Zoo • “Pepsodent” – One of America’s oldest and most popular toothpastes, Pepsodent was introduced in 1914. It reached legendary status as the sponsor of Bob Hope’s immensely successful nbc radio show • “pants on a Roxy usher” – When the Roxy opened in March 1927, at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 50th Street, it was the world’s largest and most ornate movie palace with 6,214 seats. Roxy ushers were uniformed, groomed and disciplined like a military guard. They were very young, very polite and their pants were always perfectly creased. The Roxy was demolished in 1960

anything goes • “Plymouth Rock” – On September 16, 1620, the Mayflower set sail from Plymouth, England, bound for the New World with 102 ultra-conservative English Puritans. 41 passengers came from Leiden, Holland, to which they had emigrated in 1609, and 61 others from England. On November 21, they arrived at the tip of Cape Cod, now Provincetown, Massachusetts, but decided to move on and finally landed on December 21 at a rock now called Plymouth Rock. Despite all the snobbery by old American families claiming to have come over on the Mayflower, this was merely the second permanent English settlement in the New World. The first was in Jamestown, Virginia, in 1607.

• “Missus Ned McLean” – In 1908, Evelyn Walsh married Ned McLean, son of the owner of the Cincinnati Enquirer and Washington Post and bought the legendary Hope Diamond for $154,000. In 1934, Mrs McLean, by then the leading hostess of Washington, visited Russia and shocked the natives with her extravagant display of baubles includ-

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ing the Hope Diamond which had once belonged to Catherine the Great. Upon her return she said, “They hated me, yet they were fascinated. I stood for all that women who wear jewels represent. Frankly, I think I am the only person in ten years who has given poor dismal Russia a thrill.”

• “Max Gordon” – In 1934, the Rockefeller-owned Centre Theatre in Radio City was converted from a mammoth movie palace into a mammoth legitimate theatre for Max Gordon’s production of the operetta The Great Waltz.

• “jitneys” – Little bus–like taxicabs • “Anna Sten” – MGM had Greta Garbo, Paramount had Marlene Dietrich, so, in 1932 Sam Goldwyn, with a barrage of publicity, imported the Ukranian–born Anna Sten (b1908), then a fine German screen actress. After two long years of intensive training in English, Miss Sten was launched in Nana, which promptly sank • “Lady Mendl” – Actress, adventuress, interior decorator and international hostess Elsie de Wolfe (1865–1950) concluded her longtime liaison with Elisabeth Marbury and in March 1926 married Sir Charles Mendl, an attaché to the British Embassy in Paris. In later years, she told people she was older than her real age in order to seem younger, was the first woman to dye her hair blue (1924), studied yoga, and learned to stand on her head • “Missus R” – Easily America’s most remarkable First Lady, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) spoke on her own radio series for the first time in 1932 for Ponds Cream.

Later she was sponsored by Simmons Mattresses, Johns–Manville Asbestos, Remington Typewriters and Selby Shoes. She had her own programmes off and on till 1949. Mrs Roosevelt also wrote her own syndicated newspaper column, My Day, from 1936 to 1945. Her radio fees were generally donated to charity.

Miles Kreuger

Picture credits Mickey Mouse toy made by Dean’s 1930’s (velvet); Portrait of Mohandas Karamchand (Mahatma) Gandhi by V R Rao, India House, London; Hyperion, winner of the Derby 1933 by Sir Alfred Munnings

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Cruising at other times As long ago as 1844 P&O invented deep-sea cruising. The novelist William Makepeace Thackeray was given a free ticket by P&O on one of their first “cruises” to the Mediterranean.

Thackeray was a favourite weekend guest of the 2nd Lady Ashburton (see page 21) at The Grange where he undoubtedly regailed the other guests with the joys of these voyages on board P&O’s magnificent vessels. Somehow the present Lady Ashburton has in her bedroom Thackeray’s baby highchair made of black lacquer inlaid with mother of pearl.

violin 1

violin 2

viola cello double bass By 1890 the artist W W Lloyd was taken on board to sketch life at sea. He was also a member of the Welsh 23rd Infantry at Isandlwanha.

These P&O pencillings belong to Judith Becher, our House Manager.

In 1881 an Indian law student, Mahatma Gandhi, had sailed from Bombay to Marseilles. In 1931 he repeated the journey aboard P&O’s Rajputana (photographed here with Captain H M Jack) on his way to the Round Table Conference. Gandhi was very much the top in 1934 (page 86).

the orchestra of grange park

reeds

trumpet trombone percussion kit manager

Andrew Court Matthew Fairman Nicolette Brown Megan Pound Carole Howat Jo West Zoe French Jenny Gibbs Bridget Davey Jayne Spencer Stephen Wright Angela Bonetti Martin Fenn Lionel Handy Jo Easthope Caroline Harding Dawn Baker Andrew Knights David Roach Dai Pritchard Duncan Lamont Steven Stewart Clare Duncan Joe Atkins Rob Workman Joanne May Rob Millett Mark Lacey

“Cruising” in the late twentieth century came to mean something else.

A minister described his cruise to Clapham Common as “a moment of madness”.

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The Turn of the Screw is very generously supported by

The Carphone Warehouse

Previous Grange Park productions supported by The Carphone Warehouse 2001 Cosi fan tutte 2000 The Mikado

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an opera in a prologue and two acts

Benjamin Britten (1913 – 1976) to a libretto by Myfanwy Piper after the story by Henry James First performed Venice Festival, September 14, 1954 First performance in England Sadler’s Wells, London, October 6, 1954 Performances at The Grange June 30, July 2, 6, 11, 2002

The Turn of the Screw Lionel Friend Conductor

David Fielding Director

Andrew Walsh Designer

Chris Davey

the prologue the governess flora miles mrs grose the housekeeper miss jessel the former governess peter quint the former manservant

Jeffrey Lloyd Roberts Natasha Marsh Megan Kelly William Sheldon Clarissa Meek Janis Kelly Jeffrey Lloyd Roberts

Lighting Designer

by arrangement with Boosey & Hawkes

the orchestra of grange park

Leader Andrew Court

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The Turn of the Screw act one

prologue

An unknown man tells us about a woman hired as governess to two children in the country. The sole condition of her employment is that their only relative, a young man-about-town, is not be troubled by any further communication from her. Overcome by the gentleman’s charm, the woman accepts the position.

Scene 1 The Journey On her journey into the country the governess is full of doubts.

Scene 2 The Welcome Her worries are happily dispelled on her arrival at Bly. The housekeeper, Mrs Grose, is in the midst of coaching the children, Miles and Flora, on how to behave on meeting their new governess. The governess is immediately taken with them. The children rush her off on a tour of the house and grounds.

Scene 3 The Letter Life runs smoothly at Bly until the governess receives a letter from Miles’ school informing her that the boy has been expelled. Shocked, she asks the housekeeper if she has ever known Miles to be bad, and Mrs Grose speaks up in his defence. Their discussion is interrupted by the children playing. Enchanted by their innocence, the governess resolves to say nothing to Miles about the letter.

Scene 4 The Tower The governess walks through the gardens in rapt reflection on the beauty of her charges and their surroundings. Looking up at the tower she spies an unknown man staring at her. Unsettled, she runs back to the house.

Scene 5 The Window The children are playing when the governess calls them to prepare for an excursion. Planning to follow them, she sees the unknown man through the window. Shaken she describes the intruder to Mrs Grose, who identifies him as Peter Quint, former valet to the children’s uncle. Quint had been left

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in charge of the household and, according to the housekeeper, had abused his position. The previous governess, Miss Jessel, had been forced to leave her employment, and had subsequently died. Quint was killed in an accident. The horrified governess fears Quint has returned for the children, and resolves to protect them.

Scene 6 The Lesson The governess supervises the children at their lessons.

Miles is practising his Latin declensions when he recites a mnemonic unfamiliar to her. On being questioned, he claims: ‘I found it, I like it, do you?’

Scene 7 The Lake Flora and the governess sit at the edge of the lake.

The governess becomes aware of a woman standing on the far shore watching them. She is convinced that the woman is Miss Jessel and that Flora has seen her too.

Scene 8 At Night The powerful imaginative force of Quint and Miss Jessel draw the sleeping children into the night garden. The governess and Mrs Grose, frantic with worry, finally discover them and send them back to bed. Miles tells the governess: ‘ You see, I am bad, I am bad, aren’t I?’

* dinner interval

(85 minutes) *

act two Scene 1 Colloquy and Soliloquy Peter Quint and Miss Jessell engage in a bitter dialogue of reproach and troubled passions. The governess, meanwhile, feels suffocated by a sense of helplessness against the evil enclosing her.

Scene 2 The Bells Sunday service is beginning at the local church. As the organ sounds, Flora and Miles play a word game based on the Benedicite. The children’s playing delights Mrs Grose but disturbs the governess, who believes them possessed by the ghosts. Mrs Grose

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suggests that they all might benefit by joining the congregation inside, and bundles Flora into the church. Before following, Miles inquires when he will be returning to school, and asks the governess whether his uncle thinks what she thinks. The governess, upset by the boy’s implied challenge to her authority, vows to leave Bly immediately.

Scene 3 Miss Jessel She runs back to the house to pack while the children are still at prayers. An overpowering sense of Miss Jessel’s presence arrests her at the doorway to the schoolroom. She finds the courage to challenge the ghost and drive it from the room. But the growing danger convinces her that she must not abandon the children. Instead, she writes a letter to her employer beseeching him to see her at once.

take her away. The governess, devastated, realises that Flora is lost to her forever.

Scene 8 Miles Before leaving to deliver Flora back to her uncle, the housekeeper warns the governess that her letter was never delivered. The governess steels herself for a confrontation with Miles. The boy confesses to taking the letter, but as the governess presses him to name his associate he falters, forcing Quint to make his presence ever more felt. As the struggle reaches a climax Miles collapses, crying out in torment ‘Peter Quint! You devil!’ Miles lies dead at the feet of the governess. © Daniel Dooner

Scene 4 The Bedroom Miles sits in his bedroom before undressing for bed.

The governess warns the boy of her letter in an attempt to force him to confess his relationship to the ghosts. Quint’s voice orders the boy to stay silent. The bedroom candle suddenly blows out.

Young church goers 1952 by Eve Arnold

Scene 5 Quint Miles, coaxed by the voice of Quint, steals the governess’s letter.

Scene 6 The Piano Miles entertains the two women with a piano recital, while Flora plays at cat’s cradle. The governess confides to Mrs Grose that she has written the letter.

The housekeeper, encouraged by Flora, eventually nods off and, with the governess’s attention distracted

by Miles’ surprising virtuosity, Flora seizes the opportunity to slip away undetected.

Scene 7 Flora The women find Flora by the lake. The governess accuses the girl of going to meet Miss Jessel. She believes she sees the ghost and hears its voice appealing to the girl not to betray their friendship, but Mrs Grose sees and hears nothing. Flora lashes out at the governess: ‘I can’t see anybody, I can’t see anything, nobody, nothing’. The girl pleads with Mrs Grose to

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Now you see him, now you don’t Ghosts in the machine? The hauntings at the country house of Bly in both Henry James’s short story and Benjamin Britten’s opera pesistently resist exorcism. Michael Fontes investigates and attempts to explain why.

Pliny says that in the desarts of Africk, you shall meet oftentimes with fairies appearing in the shape of men and women, but they vanish quite away like phantastical delusions. John Aubrey’s apparitions don’t often behave like ordinary phantastical delusions. The Laird Bocconi appeared to his friend Lord Middleton imprisoned in the Tower of London after the Battle of Worcester, under three locks. My Lord Middleton asked him if he were dead or alive. He said dead, and that he was a ghost; and told him, that within three days he should escape, and he did so, in his wife’s clothes. When he (the ghost) had done his message, he gave a frisk, and said: Givenni Givenni ‘tis very strange, In the world to see so sudden a change.

And then gathered up and vanished. Most ghosts don’t give frisks; most ghosts adopt a sober and Wilton Castle, near Enniscorthy, County Wexford © Simon Marsden 1980

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reserved demeanour. Aubrey does, however, mention another which appeared not far from Cirencester in 1670, and which being demanded whether a good spirit or a bad, returned no answer; but disappeared with a curious perfume and most melodious twang, thus becoming my favourite ghost in the history of English belles lettres.

In Henry James’s short story only the Governess sees the ghosts. At least when Flora seems to be communing with Miss Jessel by the lake at the end, Mrs Grose, the housekeeper, doesn’t see the ghost at all. Mrs Grose is quite prepared to believe in the hauntings: after all, she recognises Quint from the Governess’s description of him after his first appearance in the tower; but when the moment comes she sees nothing. You may say that the vision the Governess sees on the tower is the archetypal nineteenth–century image of a ravisher, with striking

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good looks and red hair, but the fact that she has no prior indication of Quint’s appearance tells against those who want to make the ghosts just creatures of the Governess’s diseased imagination. The Governess is surprised at Mrs Grose’s failure to see Miss Jessel, but not as alarmed as we might expect: ‘You don’t see her exactly as we see? – You mean to say you don’t now – now? She’s as big as a blazing fire! Only look, dearest woman, look–!’ Flora too denies seeing anything, but her behaviour – she’s described in the stage directions of the opera as being beside the lake watching – suggests the opposite. James writes some of his most magnificently opaque sentences at this moment in the story, leaving the reader guessing what really happened, but sure about what the Governess thinks happened. After all, she feels justified in coming out into the open at last, in saying to Flora: ‘She’s there, you little unhappy thing – there, there, there, and you know it as well as you know me!’

James’s framing device creates the necessary claustrophobic atmosphere. The attractive dilettante instructs her most precisely. The Governess must deal with all problems herself. She must never trouble him – but never, never: neither appeal nor complain nor write about anything; only meet all questions herself . . . take the whole thing over and let him alone.

James tells us a lot implicitly about the Governess’s emotional condition in describing her reaction to her employer. She saw him in all the glow of high fashion, of good looks, of expensive habits, of charming ways with women. We learn all this not from the pages of the thin, old-fashioned, gilt-edged album, the Governess’s record of what happened, but from Douglas, her old friend (and lover (?); some fanciful critic has gone so far as to suggest that he is in fact little Miles, grown up), in whose reading of the old book the story unfolds. We are looking through double gauze into the heart of an impressionable twenty–year–old daughter of a poor country parson.

In her own account the Governess confirms her impressionability, with references here and there to the distinguished remote man, in words suggesting that social deference has heightened sexual attraction by making its object unattainable. James subtly suggests the Governess’s attitude to Miles through the words she uses of him: he was incredibly beautiful . . . everything but a sort of passion of tenderness for him

Still from the 1947 Robert Siodmak film Time out of Mind

was swept away by his presence; there was in this beautiful little boy something extraordinarily sensitive, yet extraordinarily happy; an imperturbable little prodigy of delightful lovable goodness. The sentences come pages apart in the story and their effect is subtly cumulative. She speaks very powerfully of Flora too: she was the most beautiful child I had ever seen.

Those who are looking for extra reasons for tension in her about her charges see her feelings for her employer increasing the weight of her duty until it becomes too much for her. In one interpretation these passages suggest the governess’s desire to thwart the passage of the children to puberty, to the sexual world of Quint and Miss Jessel, a world remote from her. In another the beauty and fragility and apparent perfection of the children increase their vulnerability and hence the gravity of her responsibilities and her accountability to the distant dashing man she thinks she loves.

Much of James’s skill as a storyteller lies in his deliberate ambiguities. He hints; he suggests; some of the hints and suggestions seem almost to contradict others, but he leaves you to make things out for yourself, to construct with your imagination, knowing that such constructions can be more vivid and terrifying than a more concrete, carefully defined world. Painters have long appreciated the power of

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the eye to feed the imagination, and a large chapter of the history of western art has been devoted to exploring this process. Much of the magical attraction of the Mona Lisa lies in the painting’s subtle internal contradictions; in particular, the two parts of the landscape behind the figure are inconsistent; the levels are subtly different. You don’t notice this at first glance; neither do you notice that Leonardo has smudged the corners of the eyes and mouth, the most telling indicators of mood and facial expression. The eye constructs; it tries to make sense of what it sees, and, because of the ambiguities, it constructs first one thing, then another, so that the figure seems to move, to flicker, to smile and then not to smile – to come to life.

Look at this rather crude reproduction of a seventeenth-century drawing by Pietro da Cortona:

What does it represent? A bit of an occluded front from some strange weather map? No, if you look carefully you can see it’s a seventeenth-century mason in a bowler hat – mandatory gear for seventeenthcentury masons – on the other side of a wall which he is pointing; that’s the top of his trowel on the left.

Once your eye has something to go on it constructs amazingly. Whenever you try to tie down James’s story, to work out for certain what happens, to produce a consistent interpretation, it eludes you. A contradictory idea comes to trouble you, an inconsistency becomes insupportable, an uncertainty becomes a fear.

These uncertainties and fears create deeper unease in the reader because Bly is initially so ordinary, so apparently free from threats. The Governess receives a thoroughly pleasant impression; she talks of the broad, clear front, its open windows and fresh curtains and the pair of maids looking out. Hitchcock very well understood that suspense builds intensely when everyday objects are changed by suggestion into menaces or threats. The sense of unease quickly turns to real fear when provoked by the homely, the familiar, by things whose presence we have taken for granted. The Birds uses this idea very effectively, but North by Northwest provides the most famous

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“I quite agree – in regard to Griffin’s ghost, or whatever it was, – that its appearing first to the little boy, at so tender an age, adds a particular touch. But it’s not the first occurrence of its charming kind that I know to have been concerned with a child. If the child gives the effect another turn of the screw, what do you say to two children –?”

“We say of course,” somebody exclaimed, “that two children give two turns!”

Henry James The Turn of the Screw example. In the film’s most brilliant sequence, Cary Grant has been lured into flat open countryside for a meeting with Kaplan, a non-existent double whom he’s been trying to locate. He arrives by bus at a deserted road crossing surrounded by ploughed-up dirt and cornfields, a barren windswept landscape. He is entirely vulnerable in his smart city suit. Cars pass.

A truck covers him in dust. A car drops a rustic elderly man on the other side of the road. The man crosses over to wait for a bus – Is this man Kaplan?

He looks too homely, altogether too unkempt; he’s probably a farm labourer. Can he be dangerous? All the time a crop-dusting plane is dusting a nearby field.

The man looks across at the plane and remarks slowly: ‘That’s funny . . . That plane’s dustin’ crops where there ain’t no crops.’ A bus arrives at this moment; the man gets on and away it goes, leaving Cary Grant alone with his doubts. Sure enough, the harmless, preoccupied crop-duster, which has been just part of the furniture of the scene until now, slowly turns and comes for him. The familiar has become threatening; when you were expecting one source of danger you become suddenly conscious of another.

James’s story wouldn’t be so unsettling if the children were not superficially so perfect. Britten and Piper play with fire by hinting at other things quite early in the opera: ‘While you and I diddle-diddle . . .’ In the story the Governess comes but slowly to suspect their complicity, and becomes sure only when Miles admits that Flora has looked out of the window in the middle of the night on his instructions, to draw the Governess’s attention to the fact that he has gone out. Miles’s apparent ingenuousness about this when

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questioned adds further to the sense of mystery, because it is surprising – in the circumstances you would expect the little boy to be covert. James also manages a terrifying effect in this famous scene by playing brilliantly with your expectations: the Governess looks out onto the lawn at night, to see why Flora was gazing out of the window; ‘the moon made the night extraordinarily penetrable and showed me on the lawn a person, diminished by distance, who stood there motionless and as if fascinated, looking up to where I had appeared – looking, that is, not so much straight at me as at something that was apparently above me. There was clearly another person above me – there was a person on the tower; but the presence on the lawn was not in the least what I had conceived and had confidently hurried to meet. The presence on the lawn – I felt sick as I made it out – was poor little Miles himself.’ James brilliantly withholds the identity of the person on the lawn – The Brown Lady of Raynham Hall Country Life 1936

you think it’s Quint, of course, and are braced for that – but tells you indirectly that Quint is present, that there is a second menace, but behind, above: Miles is looking though her at Quint. It’s the most chilling moment in the book.

Miles’s expulsion from school alerts the reader to potential trouble; it suggests a problem because it is so inexplicable. James preserves obscurity on this point until the mesmeric last pages of the story, and, even when he reveals something, typically he suggests rather than explains: the boy didn’t steal – the ‘no! yes!’ of the opera is out of character – but he ‘said things’, he admits, to those boys he ‘liked’. Perhaps Quint’s language relayed through Miles was rougher than the Headmaster could accept – Flora has shocked Mrs Grose in the night by the words she uses about the Governess – perhaps James expects you to read something more lubricious into Miles’s words.

Plenty of people have thought so.

Many critics tie their flag to a mast: the ghosts are inventions of the Governess’s imagination; the hauntings are real – the children are possessed. Either interpretation diminishes James’s achievement, which is a wonder of suggestion and counter-suggestion, until the ghosts flicker into and out of focus like the Mona Lisa’s smile. James wanted both interpretations to be attractive and sustainable . . . up to a point. His characters speak in broken phrases, their words often mixed into descriptive paragraphs, so that at times you have to read a passage twice to be sure who has said what, before you can start to be sure just what they mean. The very end illustrates this point powerfully. Quint has just appeared at the window: ‘Is she here?’ Miles panted as he caught with his sealed eyes the direction of my words. Then as his strange ‘she’ staggered me and, with a gasp, I echoed it, ‘Miss Jessel, Miss Jessel!’ he with sudden fury gave me back.

I seized, stupefied, his supposition – some sequel to what we had done to Flora, but this made me only want to show him that it was better still than that. ‘It’s not Miss Jessel! But it’s at the window – straight before us.

It’s there – the coward horror, there for the last time!’

At this, after a second in which his head made the movement of a baffled dog’s on a scent and then gave a frantic little shake for air and light, he was at me in a white rage, bewildered, glaring vainly over the

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place and missing wholly, though it now, to my sense, filled the room like the taste of poison, the wide overwhelming presence. ‘It’s he?’

I was so determined to have all my proof that I dashed into the ice to challenge him. ‘Whom do you mean by “he”?’

‘Peter Quint – you devil!’ His face gave again round the room, its convulsed supplication. ‘Where?’

Who is the devil? Quint or the Governess? In the opera the director has to answer these questions because the music is more explicit than James’s words – it supplies intonation, the lack of which in writing is so brilliantly exploited by James. Here is the equivalent passage in the libretto: miles Is he there, is he there? governess Is who there, Miles? Say it! quint Don’t betray us Miles! miles Nobody, nothing. governess Who? Who? Who made you take the letter?

Who do you wait for, watch for? Only say the name and he will go for ever, for ever. quint On the banks, by the walls, remember Quint.

At the window, on the tower, when the candle is out, remember Quint. He leads, he watches, he waits, he waits. miles Peter Quint, you devil.

(He runs into the Governess’s arms) The switch in Miles’s question from ‘Is she there?’ to the more open ‘Is he there?’ shows how Piper and Britten felt they had to opt for the explicit where James had cherished ambiguity. They also opted for visible ghosts and made a wonderfully alluring creature out of Quint in particular.

The audience finds itself invited to believe in the ghosts because it sees them. Kurosawa in Rashomon, the film about the young couple who are attacked by a bandit while travelling through a wood, exploits our willingness to believe what we see. The film tells the story of the same rape and murder four times, each time through the eyes of a different person: the murdered man, the wife, the bandit, and a peasant who was hiding in a bush and saw everything. The three actors play out the scene in four wildly different ways, and, because you see what happens, each time you find it hard to remember you are seeing just a version of the story enacted. You believe each account as it unrolls before you. You have to pinch yourself each time to remember you are only seeing one person’s

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Mona Lisa (detail) by Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519) Louvre, Paris © Giraudon / Bridgeman Art Library

view of what happened.

Britten and Piper, operating in a visual medium, lack James’s power on the printed page to hint and to obfuscate. They often make specific what James deliberately left obscure. They bring the ghosts out onto the stage and make them speak, though only to each other and to the children; in the scene in the schoolroom Miss Jessel talks to herself as much as to the Governess. They have one resource, however, which was denied the novelist. Britten’s music suggests a troubled brooding world, a Bly which is inhabited by ghosts even before one steps onto that crenellated tower. James was familiar with the work of the Society for Psychical Research: both his father and brother were members. Britten had his own agenda: he knew what the story meant for him and presented his view with the extraordinary means at his disposal. He said that a chamber opera was best adapted for the expression of intimate feelings. The strength of the musical presentation of those feelings, the evocation of mounting tension as the horrible story unfolds, compensates for the loss of James’s astonishing ability to seem to be saying one thing one moment and denying it the next.

Michael Fontes

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The Second Coming

by W B Yeats Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand.

The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.

That darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

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Filthy Britten

by Valentine Cunningham ‘O arsehole, scrotum, penis, bless ye the Lord.’ Valentine Cunningham, professor of English at the University of Oxford, reveals what the Latin bits in The Turn of the Screw really mean. Extract from The Guardian January 2002 Some of the oldest passages in the libretto of Britten’s opera are the Latin bits – the most cryptic parts of what is a rather mysterious work.

What is startling is that these passages have never been properly decrypted in the whole course of the Britten Screw’s history. The army of scholars and musicologists has kept them at arm’s length. Even those many music historians eager to demystify Britten’s life in his works, and uncover the homosexual narrative at their heart, have lacked curiosity about what is actually being sung at these textually darkened moments. They have left their Latin dictionaries in Britten’s closet. There are three main chunks of Latin in the libretto: the children’s Latin lesson, given by the Governess; Miles’ singing of a Latin rhyme Malo, Malo; and a weird benedicite in a version not known to the Anglican prayer book.

During his Latin lesson Miles sings a rhyming clutch of masculine Latin nouns: “To the masculine are assigned . . . amnis, axis, caulis, collis, clunis, crinis, fascis, follies, fustis, ignis, orbis, ensis, panis, piscis, postis, mensis, torris, unguis and canalis, vectis, vermis, and natalis . . . sanguis, pulvis, cucumis, lapis, cases, manes, glis.” These are some of the memory-aiding verses that helped you learn the gender of Latin nouns, from the back of Benjamin Hall Kennedy’s standard Victorian schoolbook, the Shorter Latin Primer. And Britten gave his librettist Myfanwy Piper these words from a copy of Kennedy he had borrowed.

The Primer glosses these nouns of masculine gender into English: river, axle, stalk, hill, hind-leg, etc. These glosses are Kennedy’s cover, as well as extending his coy jesting, But hind-leg for clunis?

Clunis my arse, you might say. Clunis is anus, arsehole (its plural, clunes, means buttocks). Caulis (cabbage stalk) was Latin slang for penis, follies (bellows, punchbag) slang for scrotum, vectis (crowbar) a low

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term for penis, cucumis (cucumber) another jokily penile term. And the list goes on, packed with suggestive phallic objects: fascis (bunch of sticks), fustis (knobbed stick), ensis (sword), torris (firebrand), canalis (waterpipe). The diminutive of vermis (worm) was vermiculus, another slang term for penis.

Kennedy was playing school-master funnies, a camp semaphore to other Latin masters in the linguistic know. The allusiveness, just safe enough, was cannily endorsed by Britten. He was knowingly signalling to his gay friends, men like W H Auden, who had all been through the Kennedy mill and many of whom had taught at boys’ schools.

All this gives real point to the libretto’s strange benedicite: “O amnis, axis, caulis, collis, crinis, fascis, follis, bless ye the Lord.” This has long been accepted as being in some way blasphemous. Exactly how becomes clear when you translate it: “O arsehole, scrotum, penis, bless ye the Lord.” It becomes a gay Christian male’s earnest claim for a kind of sanctity of the gay male body, unrecognised by Britten’s church.

And this helps grant meaning to the otherwise mysterious Malo, Malo song: “Malo, malo, malo, I would rather be, malo malo, malo in an apple tree, malo, malo, malo than a naughty boy, malo, malo, malo in adversity.” This rhyme was librettist Piper’s contribution to the Screw’s Latinisings. It was from “an old grammar” to help boys distinguish the verb malo (I wish) from nouns malus (apple tree), malum (apple) and malum (evil, adversity) and from the adjective malus ( bad, wicked, noxious).

Suddenly, if you know your Latin, you hear this boy singing that he would rather be elsewhere, is still anxious about “adversity” and being the agent or recipient of ill. He wants to be up an apple tree, the boy scrumper, a minor trangressor we can all tolerate.

But there is also a more dramatic suggestion of a

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gender-crossed Eve, the temptress whose apple induced Adam into sexual fall.

Britten seems to be saying that we did not get his earlier point, that we are failing to see what he meant by his Michelangelo and Auden settings, and is asking us to see it now. Except that he cannot say it right out. This was, after all, 1954. Lord Montagu and other prominent gay men had recently gone to

jail for indecency. Hence the resort to Latin. After all, it was the quietly veiled caulis, clunis and follis that were to praise the Lord. And it would seem that only the trusties, Britten’s classics-educated friends, had ears to hear that. Britten, meanwhile, kept his marked-up copy of Kennedy by him. It has been in the Britten-Pears Library collection all this time.

Unread.

the orchestra of grange park violin 1 violin 2 viola cello double bass flute / alto flute oboe / cor anglais clarinet bassoon horn percussion piano / celeste harp manager

amnis axis caulis collis clunis

crinis fascis follis fustis ignis

orbis ensis panis piscis postis

mensis torris unguis canalis vectis

vermis natalis sanguis pulvis cucumis

Andrew Court Zoe French Stephen Wright Lionel Handy Caroline Harding Christine Messiter Andrew Knights Mark Lacey Julia Stanforth Richard Berry Joanne May Jeremy Cooke Gabriella Dall’Ollio Mark Lacey

lapis casses manis glis 101

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Alfred Boe (Ferrando), Mark Stone (Guglielmo) in CosĂŹ fan tutte Grange Park Opera 2001

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Biographies GRAHAM BICKLEY Billy Crocker Anything Goes Graham Bickley’s work in the West End includes appearances in Pirates of Penzance, The Pyjama Game, Les Misérables, Metropolis, Miss Saigon and Sunset Boulevard, in which he played opposite Petula Clark. Other productions include the UK première of I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change, the world première of Black Goes With Everything and concert arena productions of Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita. On the concert platform, he has performed with orchestras throughout the world including London Symphony, Hallé, RTE, Gothenburg Symphony and São Paulo Symphony. For BBC Radio, concerts include Nathan Detroit Guys & Dolls (Royal Festival Hall), On The Town and Radio Rhapsody, a recreation of a 1930s American radio broadcast (Barbican Centre). In 2000, Graham made his début at the Proms, performing in Kurt Weill’s Street Scene and a Stephen Sondheim tribute concert. He appeared as Joey Boswell in the BBC TV series Bread and toured throughout the world with the vocal harmony group Stutz Bear Cats. Graham has recorded extensively for That’s Entertainment Records. Recent engagements include concerts at Kenwood House and concert performances of Wonderful Town (Rotterdam). Future plans include Nathan Detroit Guys & Dolls (Vienna).

HAMISH BROWN Giuseppe La Traviata Hamish Brown is from Glasgow. He turned to singing full time after studying maths and working as a computer software consultant. Whilst studying opera at RSAMD roles included Albert Albert Herring, Basilio / Curzio Marriage of Figaro, Flute MSND and Remendado Carmen. Recent roles include Ferrando Così fan tutte (London Opera Players), Quint The Turn of the Screw (New Cambridge Opera), Bardolph Falstaff (British Youth Opera) and most recently Alfredo La Traviata (London Opera). He currently studies with Ian Baar.

PTOLEMY CHRISTIE Assistant Director La Traviata Ptolemy Christie studied social anthroplogy and film at Manchester University and has worked extensively in film and television. In opera he assisted John Cox on Die Frau ohne Schatten (Covent Garden), The Rake’s Progress (San Francisco), Albert Herring, Die Frau ohne Schatten and Capriccio (Australian Opera). He assisted on Götterdämmerung and Die Walküre (Tiroler Festspiele Erl, Austria) and Jenufa (Hanover Oper). He made his début at Grange Park last year assisting on I Capuleti e I Montecchi.

DEIRDRE CLANCY Designer La Traviata Deidre Clancy is twice winner of the highest honour in British theatre, the Olivier Award for Best Costume Design. From her first successes with the world première of D H Lawrence Trilogy (Royal Court) and subsequent world premières of many Edward Bond and Joe Orton plays, she has been at the heart of mainstream theatre and opera with over 100 productions in Europe, North America, Japan and Australia. She has designed for 18 productions at The Royal National Theatre, and worked with many major directors. Among Ms. Clancy’s many successes are costumes for Kiri Te Kanawa Così fan tutte (Metropolitan Opera New York), Ian McKellen Wild Honey (National Theatre and major US tour) and Glenda Jackson Strange Interlude (West End and Broadway). Films include: Return To The Secret Garden, The Virgin & The Gypsy, Basil, The Clandestine Marriage and Mrs Brown starring Judi Dench, for which she won a BAFTA Award for Best Costume Design. Ms Clancy’s finished designs are featured in many private collections, most notably the Royal Court Collection at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, USA. SIMON CLARK Elisha Whitney Anything Goes Simon trained at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. Theatre includes Much Ado About Nothing and Cyrano de Bergerac (RSC), Carson Night And Day (Theatr Clwyd), Kydd High Society (Victoria Palace), Judge Turpin Sweeney Todd (Oldham), Zeller The Sound of Music (UK tour), Tony Weller The Pickwick Papers and Buffalo Bill Annie Get Your Gun (Ipswich), Archbishop of Canterbury Richard III and Olin The Music Man (Regent’s Park), Simon Veal Plunder (Savoy), Colas Bastien and Bastienne (BAC), Officer Krupke West Side Story (UK Tour) and Alexander Molokov Chess (Denmark). Among his work for television Colditz, How We Used To Live, A Dance to the Music of Time, Eastenders and Judge John Deed.

KIM CRISWELL Reno Sweeney Anything Goes Kim Criswell is a seasoned Broadway performer, now living in London.

Broadway appearances include Nine, Baby, The First, Stardust and The Threepenny Opera. Work in the West End includes Annie Oakley Annie Get Your Gun, Elegies For Angels, Punks & Raging Queens, Dames At Sea and The Slow Drag.

She won a Helen Hayes Award for Side By Side By Sondheim and an Olivier nomination for her Annie Oakley. Elsewhere, work

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includes Lady Be Good (La Fenice, Venice), Of Thee I Sing (Opera North) and Candide (Liverpool Philharmonic) and among her appearances at the BBC Proms Wonderful Town and a Sondheim Tribute. Kim has worked extensively with conductor Wayne Marshall, including concerts at Aldeburgh, Venice, La Scala, Milan and the Konzerthaus, Vienna. She made her Paris début in 2000 in a Bernstein Gala for Nelson Mandela, appearing with Lauren Bacall. With the BBC Concert Orchestra, work includes Guys & Dolls and Gershwin Gala (BBC/Covent Garden Festival).

Among her recordings are Anything Goes, Annie Get Your Gun, Kiss Me Kate, Wonderful Town with Sir Simon Rattle (EMI), On The Town, Guys & Dolls and The Pyjama Game (TER). Plans for 2002 include further recitals with Wayne Marshall (Italy and Portugal), Lady Be Good (São Carlo Opera, Lisbon), Guys & Dolls (Konzerthaus, Vienna) and her début with the Berlin Philharmonic in Wonderful Town conducted by Sir Simon Rattle.

CHRIS DAVEY Festival Lighting Designer Chris’s extensive experience in theatre includes designs for Closer (Abbey Theatre, Dublin, Nominated Best Lighting Design Irish Times), The Force of Change (Royal Court), The Way of the World, A Woman of No Importance (Manchester Royal Exchange), Family, Passing Places (Traverse, Edinburgh), Beauty & The Beast, Lavender Blue (Lyceum, Edinburgh), Shining Souls (Peter Hall Season, Old Vic), Cause Célèbre, Then Again (Lyric, Hammersmith), In A Little World Of Our Own, Endgame (Donmar

Warehouse) Blood Wedding, Grimm Tales (Young Vic and Leicester Haymarket). For the RSC designs include Alice in Wonderland, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, A Month in the Country and The Comedy of Errors. His designs for Shared Experience include Anna Karenina, Jane Eyre, The Tempest and War & Peace (RNT). He has also designed extensively for the Tricycle Theatre, Theatre Royal Stratford East, Palace Theatre Watford and for Method and Madness. Among his work in dance theatre Jekyll & Hyde (Northern Ballet Theatre), The Car Man (Adventures in Motion Pictures, Old Vic and tour, Winner Best Musical Event Evening Standard Awards) and Shobhana Jeyasingh Dance Company. Opera credits include 2001 Grange Park Opera Festival, La Traviata (Castleward Opera), John Tavener The Fool (Gogmagogs), Gli Equivoci Nel Sembiante (Batignano Opera Festival) and The Picture of Dorian Gray (Opera de Monte Carlo).

NICK DAVIES Conductor Anything Goes After training at the RCM, Nick has had a combined career as a Music Director and Conductor. Theatre includes Miss Saigon (Theatre Royal), South Pacific (Prince of Wales), The Sound of Music and Annie Get Your Gun (West End and tour). As Music Director Nick has worked on Rodgers & Hammerstein Cinderella (New York City Opera and Japan), Les Misérables (Palace Theatre), Phantom of the Opera (Her Majesty’s Theatre), Martin Guerre (Prince Edward Theatre) and on Oklahoma and My Fair Lady (Royal National Theatre/Cameron Mackintosh). His

Brindley Sherrat ((Capellio), Finnur Bjarnason (Tebaldo) in I Capuleti e I Montecchi Grange Park Opera 2001

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conducting experience includes work with The Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (with whom he has made a number of recordings), the City of London Sinfonia, the Wren Orchestra of London, the Brandenburg Symphony Orchestra, the Hallé Orchestra and the BBC Concert Orchestra, and UK and European tours for singer Chris de Burgh.

DEBORAH DUTCHER Hope Harcourt Anything Goes Deborah was born in New York and trained at the Hartt School of Music in Hartford, Connecticut. In the US, roles include Suzie Mark Twain (Elmira Theatre, New York). In Europe, Deborah has appeared as Mary-Anne Rocky, Carmen and Priscilla Presley Elvis The Musical (European tours), and Christine Phantom of the Opera (Hamburg), and created the role of Cosette in the original German cast of Les Misérables and the Flemish production in Belgium. Work in the UK includes Christine Phantom of the Opera (UK tour and West End). Deborah has recorded original cast albums for Phantom in Flemish and German.

JOHAN ENGELS Set Designer Anything Goes Johan Engels studied Fine Arts and Design at the University of Pretoria, South Africa. Collaborations with David Pountney include the set for Turandot for this year’s Salzburg Festival, Smetana The Devil’s Wall (Prague), L’Amore dei Tre Re (Zurich) and Simplicius and Die Rose vom Liebesgarten (Zurich Opera). Other recent work includes Spartacus and a new one act ballet set to Beethoven’s 5th Piano Concerto for the Vienna State Ballet, L’Elisir d’Amore (Graz, Austria) directed by Stephen Lawless, Cinderella (Zurich Ballet), The Cherry Orchard, directed

by Janet Suzman, The Return of Ulysses (Glimmerglass Opera and New York City Opera). For the theatre, Johann’s most recent work includes Electra (Barrymore Theatre, Broadway) with Zoe Wannamaker and Claire Bloom and design for Rosencrantz & Guildenstern are Dead (Clwyd Theatre Cymru) directed by Terry Hands. Previous collaborations with Terry Hands include The Seagull (RSC) and Tamburlaine, Royal Hunt of the Sun (Tokyo), Buffalo Bill Show (Rechlinghausen), Arden of Faversham (Zurich) and Simon Boccanegra (Bremen).

DAVID FIELDING Director The Turn of the Screw Currently David is designing The Ring Cycle for The New National Theatre, Tokyo. Most recently he directed and designed Handel Rinaldo (Grange Park Opera), Shaw Back To Methuselah (RSC), Il Turco in Italia (English National Opera) and Intermezzo (Garsington). In 1993 he won the Time Out Award for best director and designer for Elisabeth II.

LIONEL FRIEND Conductor The Turn of the Screw Lionel was born in London and educated at the RCM, where he won all the major conducting prizes. After further study he joined the Music Staffs of WNO and Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Before becoming Staff Conductor at ENO, he spent three years as 2.Kapellmeister at the Staatstheater in Kassel, Germany.

At ENO he conducted over thirty productions and has also conducted opera and ballet in France, Holland, Belgium and the USA and worked for two years as Barenboim’s assistant at the Bayreuth Festival. In the concert hall and recording studio he has directed many of Europe’s orchestras and ensembles, such as the Philharmonia, BBC Symphony, Orchestre National de France, Radio Symphony Vienna, London Sinfonietta and the Nash Ensemble, with whom he has also made a number of CDs. He has appeared at the festivals of Edinburgh, Bath, Dresden, Flanders, Cheltenham and the BBC Proms. Recently he has been conducting opera in America and concerts in Hungary. Plans include further appearances in France, USA and Australia.

JOANNA GAMBLE Annina La Traviata After a career in music administration, Joanna Gamble began studying singing five years ago, training with Richard Burgess Ellis, Nicholas Powell and Mary King. Most of her early experience was gained in Europe as a member of the Collegium Vocale of Gent and La Chapelle Royale. In the UK work includes Argante Rinaldo (Abbey Opera), Mrs Peachum Threepenny Opera (Pimlico Opera), First Lady Magic Flute (Opex 2000) and appearances with ENO, Raymond Gubbay and European Chamber Opera. Future plans include Berta Il Barbiere di Siviglia (Opera a la carte) in Ireland and the Linbury Studio, Covent Garden.

ANDREW GEORGE Choreographer La Traviata Andrew George was born in Wales and recently made his choreographic début at The Metropolitan Opera House, New York with Don Giovanni. In recent seasons, he has choreographed a number of operatic works seen at the Salzburg Festival, La Monnaie, Royal Danish Opera, Goteborg Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Innsbruck Festival and Theatre des Champs-Elysees. He choreographed for I Capuleti e I Montecchi (Grange Park Opera), Marriage of Figaro (Covent Garden), Carmen (Opera North) and The Cunning Little Vixen (Opera Zuid). Future productions include The Flying Dutchman (New York City Opera), Elixir of Love (Netherlands Opera), Moses & Aaron (Basel) and Wagner’s Ring Cycle (Nuremburg).

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SIMON GREEN Lord Evelyn Oakleigh Anything Goes Simon trained at LAMDA. Recent roles include Noel Coward Noel & Gertie, Barry House & Garden (Scarborough), Lumiere Beauty & The Beast (Dominion Theatre), Bernard Nightingale Arcadia (Ipswich), Torasso Passion (Queen’s Theatre), M Andre Phantom of the Opera (Manchester). West End credits also include Robespierre The Scarlet Pimpernel (Her Majesty’s), Tin Man The Wizard of Oz and Frank Schultz Showboat (RSC). Among his work for television Bob the Host Urban Gothic (Channel 5), Eastenders and Rhona (BBC). Simon has appeared in the films Day Release and Bedrooms & Hallways.

JOHN GUERRASIO Moonface Martin Anything Goes John Guerrasio is a New York and US regional theatre veteran and founding member of the award winning Lion Theatre. Work in Britain includes Pal Joey and The Man Who Came To Dinner (Chichester Festival), Aunt Dan and Lemon (Almeida), Conversations With My Father (Old Vic), Cops (Greenwich), The Price (Bolton) and The Taming Of The Shrew (Nottingham).

Directing credits include a successful revival of The Adding Machine in New York and the critically acclaimed British première of Seventy Scenes of Halloween. For television, John has written and presented travel programmes and made appearances in As Time Goes By, Brass Eye, The American Embassy and The Armando Iannucci Show. His film credits include the MerchantIvory flop Jane Austen in Manhattan and the low budget “classics” Project Shadowchaser and Siamese Cop. Among his recent BBC radio work Little House on the Prairie and The Grapes of Wrath.

KATARINA JOVANOVIC Violetta La Traviata Katarina Jovanovic studied piano at the Music Academy of Novi Sad and singing at the Academy of Music in Belgrade with Irina Arsikin. In 1999 she moved to London to continue her studies at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama with Rudolf Piernay where appearances include roles in Don Giovanni, Romeo & Juliette, Linda di Chamonix and Evgeny Onegin (Linbury Studio, Royal Opera House). She made her début in Belgrade singing Bastienne Bastien & Bastienne, also appearing in the title role Suor Angelica and El Trujaman El Retablo Del Maese Pedro. On the concert platform, Katarina has appearanced at the Wigmore Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall, Salle Gaveau and the Theatre de la Cigale in Paris. Plans include Glagolitique Mass with the Lille National Orchestra conducted by Jean-Claude Cadesus. Katarina won the Placido Domingo Peralia Competition in Washington 2002 and first prize at the 2000 Montserrat Caballe Competition.

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JANIS KELLY Mrs Jessel The Turn of the Screw Janis Kelly studied at the RSAMD in her native Glasgow and at the RCM. As one of our most popular singers her appearances include Countess Figaro’s Wedding, La Belle Vivette, Yum Yum Mikado, Despina Così fan tutte (ENO), Violetta La Traviata, Musetta La Bohème and Magnolia Showboat (Opera North), Dorabella Così fan tutte (Garsington), Rosalinda (Scottish Opera, Opera Ireland), Iris Semele (Aix-en-Provence Festival, ENO).

Recordings include Maid of the Mountains for Hyperion and the award-winning Inspector Morse soundtracks for Virgin. Films include all the Mozart/da Ponte operas, The Knot Garden (Channel 4) and Semele (BBC). Among her recent engagements, the filming of Zoe (Channel 4), Romilda Xerxes, Alcina and Mrs Nixon Nixon in China (ENO), La Finta Semplice (Buxton), Rosalinda (Opera Ireland), Magda La Rondine (Opera North).

This season’s appearances include Vixen The Cunning Little Vixen (Opera North and Barcelona), Marschallin Der Rosenkavalier (Opera North) and Despina (ENO). She made her directorial début with last year’s production of Così fan tutte at Grange Park, and will be returning to direct Iolanthe in 2003.

MEGAN KELLY Flora The Turn of the Screw Megan was born in Scotland and trained at the Arts Educational School.

She made her début at the ENO as Flora The Turn of the Screw and returned there as part of the Bayliss Programme where she performed Nanetta Falstaff. Theatre work includes Hermia A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Royal National Theatre), Winter’s Tale, Sweeney Todd (The Watermill Theatre, Newbury), The Rivals, The Crucible and The King & I (Everyman Theatre, Cheltenham). In the West End, Megan has appeared as Cosette Les Miserables (Palace Theatre), Christine Phantom of the Opera (Her Majesty’s), Snow White Into The Woods (Phoenix), Celeste Sunday in the Park with George (National Theatre), Lake Metropolis (Piccadilly) and in Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (Palladium) and She Loves Me (Savoy). She also appeared in the Olivier Award winning production of Sweeney Todd (NT and recording for BBC Radio 2).

Other recordings include Oliver!, A Little Night Music and Brigadoon (That’s Entertainment Records).

ANTHEA KEMPSTON Purser Anything Goes Flora La Traviata Born in Leeds, Anthea started her musical training at the Junior Royal Academy of Music and graduated from the RNCM. Roles include title role Semele (Yorke Trust), Miss Wordsworth Albert Herring, Susanna

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Quentin Hayes (Clavaroche), Natasha Marsh (Jacqueline) and Glenville Hargreaves (M André) in Fortunio Grange Park Opera 2001

and Barbarina Marriage of Figaro, Giannetta L’Elisir d’Amore (Garden Opera), Caterina L’Amico Fritz (Opera Omnibus), First Lady Magic Flute (Buxton Opera House) and Lucy Threepenny Opera (Pimlico Opera / Winchester Prison). Anthea has sung with the D’Oyly Carte Company at the Savoy Theatre, London. On the concert platform, appearances include Hallé Orchestra, conducted by Kent Nagano, Scottish Chamber Orchestra (Caird Hall, Dundee) and BBC Philharmonic for a première recording of The Innocents Suite film music, which has since been broadcast on BBC Radio 3. Future plans include a number of principal roles at the International Gilbert & Sullivan Festival. Anthea studies with Ann Lampard.

JOZEF KOC Sailor Anything Goes Baron Douphol La Traviata Jozef Koc trained at the University of York and Guildhall School of Music & Drama. He was a finalist in the Kathleen Ferrier, Royal Overseas League and Richard Tauber competitions and the winner of the South East Arts competition. Roles include Marquis La Traviata and Spirit Orfeo (ENO), Fiorello Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Guide Death In Venice (GTO), Lindoro Le Pescatrici (Garsington), title role Don Giovanni (Pimlico Opera). Jozef has created roles in many new works including Heroes Don’t Dance (ROH), Ygène Doctor Ox’s Experiment, Corporal The Silver Tassie (ENO) and Inspector Grayling/Eric Cantona Misper (GTO). Overseas, roles

include Tarquinius The Rape of Lucretia (de Vlaamse Opera Studio, Antwerp) and Don Perlimplin The Nightingale’s to Blame (Die Wiener Taschenoper, Vienna). Recordings include Dr Ox’s Experiment (ENO for Deutsche Gramophon). Future engagements include Beethoven Choral Fantasy in C minor (Brighton) and Bach Mass in B Minor (Isle of Wight).

AIDAN LANG Director La Traviata Aidan graduated from Birmingham University. Notable productions include the world première of Hamilton’s Lancelot, Tamerlano (Gottingen), Carmen (Toronto), Die Zauberflöte (Barcelona), Tosca (Nice), Il Barbiere di Siviglia and Salome (Malaga), Così fan tutte (WNO), Ariadne auf Naxos (Garsington) and Die Entführung aus dem Serail (Istanbul). Among his work as Director of Productions of Glyndebourne Touring Opera, Bohème and the British première of Rilke’s Song of Love & Death. As Artistic Director of Opera Zuid, productions included Werther, Ariadne auf Naxos, La Bohème, The Cunning Little Vixen, Don Giovanni and Hansel & Gretel. Recent work includes Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria (Lisbon), Lucio Silla (Garsington), the British première of Delius’ The Magic Fountain (Scottish Opera), Don Giovanni, Cavalleria Rusticana, I Pagliacci (Brazil), The Barber of Seville (Welsh National Opera) and La Finta Semplice, Schubert’s Fierrebras and Un Giorno di Regno (Buxton Festival). Work this season includes La Sonnambula and a new Ring Cycle (Brazil).

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Quentin Hayes (Clavaroche), Natasha Marsh (Jacqueline) in Fortunio Grange Park Opera 2001

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JEFFREY LLOYD-ROBERTS Peter Quint/Prologue The Turn of the Screw Jeffrey was born in Wales and studied at the Royal Northern College of Music.

He has sung Janek The Makropulos Case (WNO), Nemorino L’Elisir d’Amore (ETO), Le Comte de Nangis Le Roi Malgré Lui, Walther Tannhauser and Enrico Aroldo (Chelsea Opera Group) and appeared in Weill’s Love Life (Opera North). He sang title role Albert Herring (Garsington), a role repeated in concert under Steuart Bedford (Harrogate Festival). Other roles include Andres Wozzek and Eurymacus The Return of Ulysses (Opera North), Burlotto Le Pescatrici, Lummer Intermezzo (Garsington), Florestan Fidelio, Don Jose Carmen, Macduff Macbeth (ETO), Judas The Last Supper (Glyndebourne Festival Opera at the Queen Elizabeth Hall). He has appeared at Grange Park as Lensky Eugene Onegin, Husband Breasts of Tiresias and Don Basilio/Don Curzio Figaro. Plans include Molqui The Death of Klinghoffer (BBC), Henry Morosus Die Schweigsame Frau (Garsington) and High Priest Idomeneo (GTO).

LINDA MARLOWE Evangeline Anything Goes In London, Linda’s acting credits include Berkoff’s Women (New Ambassadors), The Misanthrope (Young Vic), 900 Oneonta (Lyric, Hammersmith), A Flea In Her Ear, Too Clever By Half (Old Vic) and Sore Throats (Royal Court). For the RSC, appearances include Oedipus Trilogy, The Virtuoso and Twelfth Night.

Among her work with Steven Berkoff Decadence (Edinburgh, London, Dublin, Los Angeles), Hamlet, Greek, The Trial (London Theatre Group). Television credits include Spooks, Midsomer Murders, Dalziel & Pascoe and That Kind of Girl. Linda also has extensive experience as a director: A View From The Bridge (Leicester Haymarket), The Games Rule, High Brave Boy (RSC Festival, King’s Head), Metamorphosis (Manchester Contact Theatre) and CP Taylor’s Black & White (King’s Head).

NATASHA MARSH The Governess The Turn of the Screw Natasha Marsh was born in Brecon, Wales. She spent four years with the National Youth Music Theatre and later studied at Birmingham University and the RCM. Roles include Acis Acis & Galatea and Polyphemus (Birmingham Early Music Festival), Polly The Threepenny Opera (Barber Concert Hall), Belinda Dido & Aeneas and Vespina L’infedeltà Delusa (Snape Maltings). At the London Handel Festival she has sung the role of Polissena Radamisto, Adelaide Lotario and Flavia Sillia (recently recorded for Hyperion). Other roles include Jacqueline Fortunio (Grange Park), Pamina Magic Flute and Micaela Carmen (ETO) and Polissena Radamisto (Opera North). Recent work includes the cre-

ation of the title role in Michael Berkeley’s new opera Jane Eyre (Music Theatre Wales) and Chabrier Une Education Manquée (Les Azuriales Opera). Future engagements include Ilia Idomeneo (Opera North) and Iphis Jeptha, her début for Welsh National Opera. Natasha won the MOSCA Young Welsh Singer of the Year 1999.

CLARISSA MEEK Mrs Grose The Turn of the Screw Clarissa Meek studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. On leaving she joined the Scottish Opera chorus, from where she performed title role Iolanthe, a number of minor roles and understudied many more major ones. Clarissa then joined Glyndebourne Festival chorus, where again she understudied larger roles, performed Madame Larina Eugene Onegin and created the roles of Fear and Model in The Second Mrs Kong.

Other roles include Maurya in the world première of Fritz Hart’s Riders to the Sea (Cambridge University Opera), Mother Misper (Glyndebourne), Feodor Boris Godunov (Brighton Festival and recording), Alcmene Die Liebe der Danae (Garsington), Marthe Faust (Mid-Wales Opera) and Annie Fisher Friend of the People (Scottish Opera). She has also been seen in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (National Theatre Studio) and Sea Pictures in the Symphony Hall, Birmingham. Recent engagements include Katisha The Mikado (Grange Park Opera), Madam Larina Eugene Onegin (Pimlico Opera) and Second Squire Parsifal (Royal Opera House.

Future engagements include Virtu/Pallade L’incoronazione di Poppea (Netherlands Opera), Fox Cunning Little Vixen (Opera Theatre Company) and 2nd Lady Die Zauberflöte (Covent Garden).

TANYA MOODIE Erma Anything Goes Tanya trained at RADA. Roles include Rosalind As You Like It (Bristol Old Vic/ West Yorkshire Playhouse), Antigone The Oedipus Plays (National Theatre, directed by Peter Hall), Phebe The Darker Face of the Earth (National Theatre) and Matilda The Suit (Peter Brook Company). Among her work for the RSC, Natalie, Princess of Orange The Prince of Homburg, Maria School for Scandal, Valeria Coriolanus, Mariana Measure for Measure and Peer Gynt. Tanya’s television credits include Holby City, Maisie Raine, A Respectable Trade (BBC), Always & Everyone (Granada TV) and Boyz Unlimited (Hat Trick/Channel 4). She also appeared in Peter Hall’s film The Final Passage.

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GEORGE MOSLEY Germont La Traviata George Mosley studied at Guildhall and at the Academia Chigiana in Siena and the Munich Hochschule fur Musik.

Since winning first prize at the International Mozart Competition in Salzburg roles include Dancairo Carmen (Royal Opera House), Yamadori Madama Butterfly, Marco Gianni Schicchi and The Duke of Albany Lear (ENO), Orlofsky Die Fledermaus, Schaunard La Bohème and Papageno Die Zauberflöte (Scottish Opera) and Father Wolf Baa Baa Black Sheep (Opera North and BBC). George has worked extensively abroad, making appearances at the Teatro Verdi, Pisa, at the Teatro Comunale, Modena and with Flanders Opera. Among his recordings Aeneas Dido & Aeneas and Pallante Agrippina with John Eliot Gardiner (Phillips) and a world première recording of John Taverner Eternity’s Sunrise with the Academy of Ancient Music (Harmonia Mundi) which was nominated for a Grammy 2000. Recent appearances include Albert Werther (Bejing Festival), title role Hamlet and Fred Graham Kiss Me Kate (Teatro Regio Turin) and The Banquet (Florence and Rome). Future plans include Il Processo (Reggio Emilia and La Scala).

ALAN OKE Alfredo La Traviata Alan Oke studied at the RSAMD. He spent some years as Principal Baritone with Scottish Opera, where roles included Schaunard, Papageno, Guglielmo and Belcore. He made his Covent Garden début singing the Jester, Peter Maxwell Davies’ Taverner, with which he made his US début with Boston Opera.

In 1992 Alan gave his first performance as a tenor, Brighella Ariadne auf Naxos (Garsington). Among his roles since then Alfredo (Opera North, Castleward and GTO), Laertes Hamlet, Rodolfo (Opera North), and Camille British première Danton’s Death (New Sussex Opera). Recent engagements include Rinuccio, Gonzalves L’Heure Espagnol (Opera New Zealand), Boris Katya Kabanova (Opera North), Pinkerton Madam Butterfly (Royal Albert Hall and Opera House, Belfast), Don Caesar Maritana (Waterford), Sergei Paradise Moscow (Opera North) and Ashenbach Death in Venice (Holland). Plans include Julietta (Opera North) and Die Zauberflöte (Royal Opera House).

DAVID POUNTNEY Director Anything Goes Educated at Radley and Cambridge, David Pountney joined Scottish Opera as Production Assistant in 1970, making his début as director for the company in 1972 with The Rake’s Progress. Having directed for Scottish Opera, Wexford and the Edinburgh Festival, he became Director of Productions for Scottish Opera in 1976,

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making his US début in 1974 with Macbeth. Subsequent US work includes Flying Dutchman and Jenufa (Houston), Elektra (Los Angeles) and the world première of Glass The Voyage (Metropolitan). As Director of Productions at ENO he directed Hansel & Gretel, Busoni’s Doktor Faust, Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, Street Scene, Valkyrie and world premières by Blake, Holloway, Harvey and Osborne. As a freelance director his work has been seen at Wiener Staatsoper, Bayerische Staatsoper, La Fenice and Zurich. For Bregenz, operas include Flying Dutchman, Nabucco, Fidelio, Martinu The Greek Passion and The Golden Cockerel. He has written libretti for Peter Maxwell Davis and Stephen Oliver and numerous translations. He was made a CBE and a Chevalier des Arts et Lettres. Plans include Jenufa (Vienna), Turandot (Salzburg Festival) and Benvenuto Cellini (Zurich). He takes up the post of Intendant at Bregenz Festival in December 2003.

CRAIG REVEL-HORWOOD Choreographer Anything Goes Craig was born in Ballarat, Australia.

His career began in Melbourne with appearances in West Side Story, La Cage aux Folles, Me & My Girl and Ladies’ Night. Leaving for Europe he joined the company at the Paris Lido, later performing in the UK tour and West End production of Cats, Miss Saigon (Theatre Royal) and Crazy For You (Prince Edward Theatre). As director/choreographer, Craig has worked on Last of the Red Hot Mammas (New End), Fairy Tales (The Drill Hall) and Crazy For You (Pretoria and Cape Town). He was resident director on Miss Saigon and assisted Bob Avian on the Olivier-Award winning choreography of Martin Guerre (Prince Edward). Other work as choreographer includes Spend Spend Spend (Plymouth Theatre Royal, West End and UK National Tour) for which he received a nomination for an Olivier Award and which won the Evening Standard Award for Best Musical, La Traviata (Rotterdam and London Arena), Guys and Dolls (Sheffield Crucible), Paradise Moscow (Opera North) and Carmen (Opera Holland Park).

MARK SHANAHAN Conductor La Traviata Mark Shanahan was born in Manchester and studied at Chetham School of Music. He took his Bachelor of Music degree at London University before joining the post-graduate course at the Royal Academy of Music where he was awarded the Sir Henry Wood Scholarship and went on to win First Prize in the NAYO Conducting Competition. Mark began his association with ENO in 1991 where he has conducted Jonathan Miller’s production of The Mikado, Nicholas Hytner’s new production of The Force of Destiny, Otello, La Bohème, The Barber of Seville and a new Tim Albery production of Leoncavallo La Bohème. Further opera appearances include Wexford International Opera Festival, L’Elisir d’Amore, Così (English Touring Opera) and The Mikado and I Capuleti e i Montecchi (Grange Park). Concert work

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includes Stavanger Symphony Orchestra and regular engagements at the Royal Festival Hall where programmes have included Damnation of Faust, Belshazzar’s Feast, Das Lied von der Erde, Ein Heldenleben and Alpine Symphony. He is also a frequent conductor of the RTE Broadcasting Corporation. Film credits include Lucia based on Lucia di Lammermoor. Future plans include Don Giovanni (RNCM) and Tosca (ENO).

KEVIN SHARP Marchese La Traviata Born in Colchester, Kevin Sharp began vocal studies at the Royal Academy of Music after studying physics at Cambridge and working in banking.

As a member of the Glyndebourne Festival chorus roles included Dr Bartolo Le Nozze di Figaro, Capitano dei Balestrieri Simon Boccanegra, Sergeant of Archers Manon Lescaut, the last two televised by Channel 4. Other roles include cover Dancairo Carmen, Imperial Commissioner and cover Sharpless Madam Butterfly (Royal Albert Hall), Guglielmo Così (European Chamber Opera), Figaro (Holland Park, Opera Box) and Count Almaviva Le Nozze di Figaro (First Act Opera).

Most recently he has appeared as Guglielmo (Oyster Opera) and Lescaut Manon Lescaut (Kentish Opera).

WILLIAM SHELDON Miles The Turn of the Screw William is a pupil at City of London School. A former member of Finchley Children’s Music Group, he studies singing with Susan Singh and French horn and percussion at the Centre for Young Musicians where he also studies jazz piano. Opera includes, children’s chorus Der Rosenkavalier, Cunning Little Vixen, La Bohème (ENO) and Amahl Amahl and the Night Visitors.

William supports Arsenal, plays chess and is a keen cricketer.

EWAN TAYLOR Doctor Grenvil La Traviata South African born Ewan Taylor studied Opera and Ballet at the University of Cape Town and performed frequently with the Cape Performing Arts Board in both Opera and Ballet. Recent opera experience includes Marullo Rigoletto (European Chamber Opera), Fledermaus (Carl Rosa), Figaro (HGO), Massetto (Opera for All) and Papageno (Figaro Opera). Plans include Figaro (Lyric Hammersmith Lyric) and Colline Bohème (European Chamber Opera Asian tour) and Wexford Opera Festival.

ANDREW WALSH Designer The Turn of the Screw Andrew trained at Central St Martin’s and the Slade School of Art. Work includes Rigoletto (Opera East), Miss Julie (Salisbury Playhouse), Hansel & Gretel (Midland Arts Centre), The School for Scandal (Harrogate Theatre), Tales of Love & Justice (Finborough Theatre), Eve of Retirement (The Gate), The Ignoramus & The Maniac (White Bear Theatre), Die Liebe der Danae, Intermezzo (Garsington), Back to Methuselah (RSC) and Go (Teatro Technis).

KEVIN WEST Gastone La Traviata After working with D’Oyly Carte Kevin studied at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama. In 1993 he made his début at the Royal Opera House as Pong Turandot and in 1994 created the role of Swami Zumzum The Second Mrs Kong (Glyndebourne).

Roles since have included David Mastersingers (ENO), The Mayor Mario & The Magician, Judge 2 Broken Strings by Vir, Richard What Price Confidence? by Krenek (Almeida/ENO), The Teacher Cunning Little Vixen, Don Basilio Le Nozze di Figaro (Opera Northern Ireland), Snout A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Missail Boris Godounov, The Governor Candide (Teatro Regio di Torino), Torquemada L’Heure Espagnol (Grange Park Opera) and title role Lo Speziale (Antwerp and Barcelona). In Antwerp he also premièred a joint production of Judith Weir/Monteverdi’s Missa e Combattimento (La Monnaie and de Singel). Last season he sang Goro Madama Butterfly (Opera Holland Park), Curzio Le Nozze di Figaro (CBTO/BBC), Offenbach Dick Whittington and his Cat (City of London Festival) and Don Basilio Figaro (Opera North).

Plans include Isaaco La Gazza Ladra (Garsington).

SUE WILLMINGTON Costume Designer Anything Goes Sue Willmington studied Fine Art at Maidstone College of Art and Theatre Design on the postgraduate Motley Design Course. For the RSC, Sue has designed Love in a Wood (set and costumes), The White Devil, Richard II, Measure for Measure, Merchant of Venice and Duchess of Malfi. Opera credits include Jonathan Miller’s production of Die Schweigsame Frau (Zurich Opera), Porgy & Bess, Nabucco, Fidelio (Bregenz) La Clemenza di Tito (Minnesota Opera, ROH), Don Carlos (Zurich Opera), Il Seraglio (Opera du Rhin), Simon Boccanegra (WNO), Fanciulla del West (Zurich), Lucia di Lammermoor, Rigoletto (New Israeli Opera), Dalibor (Scottish Opera) and Genoveva (Opera North) directed by David Pountney.

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Nicknames by Diva The puzzle, dedicated to Pimlico Opera, contains a story, 24,41, whose author is 9. The story and the puzzle’s title mutually define the theme. The first correct solution opened on 30th August will receive two tickets for the 2003 festival. Send solutions to Grange Park Opera (Crossword), 5 Chancery Lane, London EC4A 1BU DOWN 1, 43 The 13 in "The 13" making poor catch reprehensible (7,8) 2 13 in 13,14 lets ugly brute collide with him doing a handstand (3,5) 3 TV drama, when doing it, needs a stir! (8) 4 School book hidden in others for forest creatures (9) 5 Nickname gets Gary Oldman going (4) 6 With one can I get bail fixed? (5) 7 Where quoted, crazy, tacit understanding, leads to nothing (4,6) 8 41 in 3 with raincoat; shaggy-haired creature seen from the rear (6) 12 Given no encouragement? That’s strange from Hamish, strange from Edward (11) 17 3’s Nickname for chap in Essex? (5) 19 People who’ve misspent time, on drugs, with Elvis, rocking?(6,5) 22 See 33 23 Nickname, considered to be posh (4) 25 Do time on prison diet without a crust to keep one afloat (5,5) 26 Regulatory body explains nothing’s left out (5) 28 At a cost lava flow engulfs university getting into trouble (9) 31 Polynesian painter entertains a cry of pity (8) 32 13 in 3 in cahoots with Archer? (8) 33, 22 41 in 13,14 takes six topless Grange performers – songbirds! (7,4) 35, 36 41 in 3 to prevent squabble about nasty ghoul (12) 38 African tribe sanctioning polygamy now and then (5) 40 Girl who gets Oldman (Gary) going (4)

ACROSS 9 A shaky start for majesty and numerous kings (5) 10 Monopoly board ruling caused Simpson to feel ill (2,2,4) 11 Agreement signed bilaterally in Bangkok (4) 13, 14 TV drama rips off big hit! Hospital sequel to Tinkerbell in another hit? (8,4,5,1) 14 See 13 15 Servings of borsch and chorizo for Dr Jekyll (6) 16 Seabed wreck may be lower (6) 18 Records allow learner to begin doing the twist?(5) 20 41 in 13,14; he’s French in a tree (3,5) 21 Olympic city fields a fast runner (8) 24, 41 Wretches shocking at the twist? (3,4,2,3,5) 27 13,14’s Nickname passed on to Irene Charles or Harry (9) 29 Craving fruit left off wine (8) 30 Fade-out after car goes up in flames (4,2,2) 34 Having nothing for a bed when not fixed? (5) 36 See 35 37 Panic in Eritrea promotes peaceful revolution (6) 39 Swallow in attempt to drink leaving old Chinese take-away? (6,4) 41 See 24 42 See 44 43 See 1 44, 42 Confine to a cold rough existence for a bit? This system could (5,4) 2

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The theme was Bellini and his operas. Auxiliary answers are as follows: ACROSS 1 sleepwalker; 26 Beatrice DOWN 3 the rule ; 12 alien; 14 corsair; 16 Protestants; 24 and 21 ACROSS I Capuleti e i Montecchi

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Solution to last year’s puzzle WHAT’S IN A NAME?

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Last year’s winner John Grimshaw of Viewfield Road, London SW18

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Other correct solutions Pamela Grosvenor, John Henly, William Mather