What one calls a happy marriage

Richard Strauss’ Intermezzo is a very strange semi-autobiographical piece apparently dealing with the married life of Richard and Pauline Strauss thinly disguised as Court Composer Robert Storch and his wife Christine.  What is really a bit weird is how these two characters are presented.  Herr Storch is a bit stuffy and self absorbed but Frau Storch is just awful.  She is rude to everyone, especially her long suffering maid and other servants, and she overreacts bizarrely to just about everything.  She’s spoiled, self-centred, vain and generally a giant PitA.

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Pogner’s Conservatory

How to portray a group of people obsessed with music in a rather formalistic and rules driven way like the characters in Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg?  The directorial team of Jossi Wieler, Sergio Morabits and Anna Viebrock, for their production at t6he Deutsche Oper Berlin in 2022, decided that the answer was to set it in a Conservatory.

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Double dwarf

The Deutsche Oper’s production of Zemlinsky’s Der Zwerg, recorded in 2019 in Berlin, is directed by Tobias Kratzer who seems to be the rising star among young German opera directors.  I can see why.  This is a thoughtful and clever production that really does have something to say without being unduly gimmicky.

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