The second instalment of Patrice Chéreau’s 1980 Bayreuth Ring cycle is set, like Das Rheingold, in a sort of industrial bourgeois late 19th century.  One would almost say steampunk if that were not an anachronism.  Actually the “industrial” side is much less evident than in the earlier work.  There’s a sort of astrolabe/pendulum thing in Valhalla but that’s about it.  Setting aside, the story telling is very straightforward; so much so that it takes a real effort of the imagination to get into a mindset where this production could ever have been considered controversial.  It’s quite literal; Brünnhilde has a helmet and breast and back plates (worn over a rather severe grey dress), Wotan has a spear, Siegmund has a sword.  There’s not an assault rifle or light sabre to be seen.  It is though dramatically effective.

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