Joachim Herz, Postmodernism Occupies Richard Wagner

Directing an opera today is a dangerous business. In striving to create a gripping evening in the theatre – not as a slave to the letter of a work, but seeking to convey its spirit without falsifying its message; shaping its drama so that the music emerges convincingly from the acting; respecting the text while also bearing in mind that human passions run up against different limits in different eras, and hence many of the old stories simply could not take place in modern times – a director is easily caught between two stools: accused of either insufficient fidelity to the original or a dearth of innovation. Both reproaches miss the point: his aim must be to treat works of the past as works of our own time, not distorting them as though they actually were works of our own time but penetrating their world and bringing it to life for our time using the means available to today’s theatre.