Back to Basics in Berlin: Hugo Shirley sees the advantages of a stripped-down production

Review of Tristan und Isolde, directed Thalheimer, conducted Runnicles, Deutsche Opera Berlin, 2025.

March 2026, Volume 20, Number 1, 55–7.

Just over a year after its premiere in Geneva, Michael Thalheimer’s new Tristan und Isolde was unveiled to Berlin audiences at the Deutsche Oper, a co-production that now replaces Graham Vick’s little-loved 2011 staging. After the British director’s producttion, which included a third act set in an old people’s home, Thalheimer’s approach feels admirably straightforward and serious, despite – or perhaps because of – the simplicity of its premise.