Something is Rotten in the State of Brabant: In the wake of the 6 January Capitol riot, Richard Laing is struck by the contemporary resonance of Stuttgart’s 2018 production

Review of Lohengrin, directed Schilling, conducted Meister, Stuttgart, 2018 (Belair Classiques, 1 Blu-ray disc).

July 2021, Volume 15, Number 2, 63–5.

Like all great fairy tales, Lohengrin is a story subject to continual re-invention, remaining eternally contemporary. In recent years, for example, it has been tempting to see the opera as an allegory for Brexit. An immigrant is welcomed into a community, for he takes on a job no one else is willing to do. His presence makes society better, stronger, safer. But reactionary elements force the asking of a momentous question, leading to a tragic break-up; the immigrant, no longer feeling welcome, must leave. Only too late is the enormity of the people’s misfortune understood. We have yet to see an explicitly Brexit-themed Lohengrin, but the opera’s political themes – the relations of a society both to outsiders and to itself – are fertile ground for directors, and the character of the titular ‘hero’ is complex enough to allow deeply contrasting depictions, not all of which have him bathed in a saintly halo.