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Perhaps one shouldn't make fun of a freak show, but this one is so elegantly aestheticised. The format is exactly right for an opera, six hours with a fascinating gallery of personalities, and a plot which gradually unfurls while the characters present "evidence" or "distractions" set in a ritualistic format and unchanging scenography. Soon enough we learn that the plot is about an accusation against an absent character who is referred to as the Big Guy – like some Fafner and Fasolt combined. The Chairman isn't neutral, he belongs to the accusing team. Overbearingly, he admits the defending team to submit the same document to the protocoll for the third time and, hours later, for the seventh time. He seems to have the power to bring great destruction, despite the best intentions, just like Wotan ends up destroying the world. To his left sits the head of Defenders whose only power is that of destroying our understanding of the world. It's a wonder they don't end up in a fist fight.
The formal layout of this opera is impressively stringent. Each speaker in turn has a five minute aria during which they may question the four Witnesses, three tenors or bass voices, and one mezzo soprano. Their arias usually end with "I yield to the next speaker" or some similar refrain. On a few occasions they are interrupted by a chaotic choir singing a complex counterpoint with difficult to discern lyrics. Some of these interruptions are followed by a calmer section in which a voice counter calls various names and asks for an "Aye" or "Ney".
The characters of the defending team, who care about narrative continuity, often refer back to an earlier opera where the defending and accusing teams played opposite roles. The Defenders show their most sympathy for one of the Witnesses, whom they prefer to question. Some of them nonetheless venture to question the other three Withesses, often in a smirking tone, or in a mode of the worst kind of Socratic dialogue imaginable in which they ask yes/no questions only to confirm their monologue. In one particularly dramatic scene, a Defender directs ad hominem accusations at a Witness, who then will have to wait through several arias before he gets an opportunity to defend himself. This is a most clever dramaturgical device by the director.
The Accusers are the ones who drive the plot forwards. Sometimes they bring in pieces of scenography, such as placates with quotations from external characters. In this brilliant narrative construction, we are told the story about the Big Guy's adventures intermittently through these sections, although he never appears on stage himself.
The cast is full of original characters. In one scene we see a speaker sitting and rocking as in a rocking-chair, and surely he would smoke a pipe were it permitted, while an uncharismatic speaker to his right does his questioning. Later, his rocking having stopped, he drills a Witness while pretending he can't recall the name of the main character in some earlier opera, although this is a weaker part of his acting. Another character, seemingly drunk, is barely able to make a coherent statement. Young agitated speakers of the Defenders' team have assistants bring in a clock counting down to the End of Business as Usual, or something to that effect, which they blame the Accusers for causing.
Six hours of excellent opera, and this is only the first act. Fatefull events may or may not transpire in the coming acts.