Phantom, Revisited

My previous review dealt with a fantastic text losing its power of presentation through mediocre direction and haphazard performances. To counteract it, however: an account of the other show I saw in London this week - a show with quite a weak script, if stronger score, that through splendid performances and at-times equally splendid direction proved the more effective piece. The Phantom of the Opera, the tale of a lovely opera singer abducted by a mysteriously tormented masked musician, may well be a chestnut, an overripe outlet for adolescent Byronic yearnings everywhere in the decades before Edward Cullen. But despite the somewhat dated melodrama of the book, and discordances of the otherwise impressive score (The titular song, for example, is a billowy rock-ballad, that works hard to out-camp its four minutes of smoke machine.), the current production manages to bring subtlety to Andrew Lloyd Webber. That is indeed a feat.

Given that so much is constant from the original 1986 production - with the exception of the lyrics, some of which have been updated with equal frequency for the better and for the worse - and that a certain degree of bombast is necessary for the tourist market, it is difficult to imagine how on earth the production could possibly still be good. And indeed there are moments, such as when the Phantom plays upon his keyboard in a shimmering gold jacket more Elton John than Gaston Leroux, or takes intermittent pauses in murdering the unfortunate Joseph Buquet to swoop his cape flourishingly from the shadows, that are little more than panem et circenses: the production's more extreme attempts at crowd-pleasing. But Harold Prince's direction at times takes its cues from the opulence of the Second Empire, not the Bonfire of the Vanities, and it is when the production loses its '80s cheese in favor of gilded decadence that a perfect union of excess and subtlety is reached. So for every "Phantom of the Opera," with smoke machines, rock bellowing, candles, and a boat (a scene that I will confess was my favorite in childhood, but can no longer quite subsume myself into), there is a "Masquerade" - an exquisitely choreographed ensemble piece that captures the grandeur of the Paris of imagination. Worthy mention must be given too to the three operas-within-operas presented - Lloyd Webber slyly manages to parody three distinct styles of opera, and Prince matches this excellently with slices of the pompously antiquarian "Hannibal," the bedroom-farce "Il Muto," and the Phantom's chillingly modern "Don Juan Triumphant". The second act, in particular, was splendid - having been toned down after the debacle of the shattered chandelier, much of the scenes are psychological rather than spectacular, as the members of the Opera Populaire deal with the looming presence of the Opera Ghost.

Much of the credit to this can be ascribed to the performances. Ramin Karimloo's "Phantom" refuses the sympathy of his audience with defiant integrity; his Phantom, however tormented, however in love, is nonetheless a mad and grossly disfigured murderer - his voice, alternating a lovely tenor and a harsh scream, the only part of him capable of sublime expression. He does not play into the simplistic fantasy found in the execrable 2004 film version, in which Gerald Butler played a cuddly antihero who simply wanted to be loved. Rather, his psychosis is palpable; we fear him even as his music thrills us, and Christine's visceral terror is indeed well founded. But it is Gina Beck whose performance outweighs even his. A trained actress, not a singer, Beck nevertheless has a lovely voice certainly capable of the role. But it is the creativity with which Beck approaches the role - which could so easily devolve into orgasmic scream queen, as did Emmy Rossum's performance in the aforementioned film - that makes her performance so astounding. Beck has choices to make about Christine's characterization - her feelings about the Phantom pre-"All I Ask of You" are left vague in the book itself - and she makes them: she allows us to see her initial curious attraction to the Phantom, melded with pity and uncertainty, and her passion for his music in the first act, before decisively recoiling with disgust after his murder of Buquet - her fascination, Beck tells us, only goes so far. Her torment in the second act is equally nuanced - this is not a woman torn between sexual repression and fulfillment, as some more Romantic interpretations would have it, but a woman toward between horror at the individual and fascination with the music, and a very personal sense of betrayal at the gap between the two. The second act duet between them, "The Point of No Return," is a perfect example of this brilliance - with each verse, Beck changes tack, alternatively testing, teasing, trapping, and tearing from her admirer, as Karimloo, surprisingly audible under layers of veil, manages to match her varied intensity without any use of his face or most of his body. As for the rest of the cast - Simon Bailey's Raoul is hindered by unfortunate sideburns, alas, Heather Jackson is an effectively chilling Madame Giry, and Barry James and Gareth Snook serve their purpose as comic foils Messieurs Firmin and Andre, respectively, with preening gusto.

The music, of course, is generally excellent - sensual and operatic, yet eminently melodic and memorable. It may not be true opera, naturally, but what it is is good and, in the case of songs like "Wishing You Were Somehow Here Again," Christine's ode to her deceased father, and "The Point of No Return," at times even brilliant. It is a testament to the talents of the cast and to the skill of the director that a play this old, and this known for eighties bombast, can still invoke passion at the music of the night.

Not, But Perhaps Can Come to, Good

At last I got a chance to see the over-hyped (or is that o'er-hyped?) RSC production of Hamlet in the West End. David Tennant, alas, was by then out of commission, having been incapacitated by a back injury some days earlier, and Edward Bennett was thus given the opportunity to make a name for himself, even as he faced the enormous, if not entirely dignified, challenge of satisfying a gaggle of gleeful gigglers salivating for the Doctor.

Bennett's performance, ultimately, like the production as a whole, was unfinished - at times indecisive, an epithet better applied to the Dane himself than to the team behind his portrayal. Unsure who Hamlet was, where he was coming from, what he wanted and why, Bennett attempted to answer some of the most fundamental questions in the Western Canon with the wavering ambiguity of a schoolboy caught without a proper grasp of his homework. He is to be partially forgiven, after all; he likely did not have the time to engage as fully with the part as if he were cast from the start. But one is forced to wonder what role the director could have played in all this nebulousness if the basic questions of Hamlet's madness and intent were left unanswered in the production.

And much of the responsibility for this production's shortcomings does indeed fall on director Gregory Doran. He has several excellent ideas - the use of a mirrored set, which begins to crack at a pivotal point in the plot, is to his credit, as well as to that of designer Robert Jones. But here again Doran loses interest halfway through; the shattered-mirror motif is never expanded upon, and the various deaths that follow are portrayed with such aesthetic disunity (and logical disunity - the stately Claudius takes mere moments to die after drinking from the poisoned cup, whereas the far smaller Gertrude lingers for several lines) that one wonders if Doran had any unifying vision at all. The nebulous period dress does not help - when Bennett emerges to deliver "to be or not to be," he turns up in jeans and a red T-shirt, a breaking of the fourth wall that, whether intentional or no, takes us nearly as out of the performance as his reappearance in Alpine gear in the final act. Without a clear sense of period, the issue of what is at stake - can Ophelia's virginity really be that precious in a world so modern Laertes has condoms in his suitcase? And, if not, does that negate some of the warnings she receives by rendering them useless protective-relative aphorisms? - is unresolved.

Some outstanding performances do work against their direction, however. Oliver Ford Davies as a blusteringly comic Polonius threatens to walk off with the production, although his interpretation has far less pathos than Sam Waterson's show-stealing interpretation at New York's Shakespeare in the Park earlier this year. (Davies's performance, by contrast, likely contributed to one novice's bathroom-queue review of the production: "I had no idea what was going on, but this play sure is funny!") Penny Downie's immaculately costumed Gertrude is also brilliant; the tragedy is hers, not Hamlet's, in the second half. Patrick Stewart is solid, if restrained, as Claudius, while Mariah Gale would be a far better Ophelia if she were not instructed to arbitrarily wave her arms about every few moments as if to wave down Fortinbras's aerial invasion.

But there is a haphazard air about the production - from the bizarre blocking to the unfinished analysis of the Prince himself. Nowhere is this more evident than the "Get thee to a nunnery scene," played with curious flatness by Bennett and unresponsive hysteria by Gale. We are unsure if Bennett despises Ophelia or loves her or, as seems likely from his portrayal, is completely apathetic and which one of them Bennett is pushing her away to protect. Michael Stuhlbarg's portrayal of Hamlet at Shakspeare in the Park may have been controversial (this reviewer found him eminently watchable, if quite manic indeed), but his decisive approach to the text rendered the scene curiously pathetic in a turnabout of tradition, as Stuhlbarg aliented Lauren Ambrose's Ophelia in order to save her from himself - a suitably twenty-first century expression of hipster angst. Choice may not be Hamlet's forte, but no actor can play any role, least of all this one, without making a few decisions about whence to approach. Bennett seems too tied up in the echoing imitations of Tennant to clearly tear into the role.

There is likely a story in all this - of the determined youth reined in by the ghosts of past masters, a story whose delicate Oedipal underpinnings prop up not only Hamlet but indeed so much of great art, if Harold Bloom's theories on the anxiety of influence are to be believed. But the result is, nevertheless, a performance unconsummated - we never quite achieve that union between text and vision of which the RSC is clearly so much more than capable.

On a further note, I am quite tired of "undated modern dress" Hamlets that are vaguely political without being remotely exciting - they are nearly as taxing, if now nowhere near as obsequious, as staid full-period pieces. I would, however, very much like to see a Hamlet torn between Protestantism and Catholicism - in set design, if nothing else - between the revenge tragedy and the stoic resignation of the Danish Protestants. It would be curious to see Hamlet at the crossroads of a variety of ideas - imagine "To Be or Not to Be" before a backdrop of Da Vinci's "Vitruvian Man." Hamlet as a play of ideas - perhaps more Magic Mountain than Elsinore. But surely worth considering nonetheless.

In Defence of Oxbridge Admissions

Tomorrow, offers for undergraduate places at Oxford will be sent out. Every one of them will demand three A-grades at A-level or equivalent. It is almost certain that nearly half those offers will go to the privately-educated. In languages or the physical sciences the proportion will be far higher. Very soon, the Guardian will demand that Something be Done about this state of affairs. The Government, smelling a general election and/or an excuse to cut spending, will threaten the funding of Oxford and Cambridge unless they make greater efforts to admit pupils from the state sector. The emergence of another Laura Spence story, especially if pushed by senior Cabinet members, would be a sure sign of a coming general election. What I should like to know is what these objectors would like to see done, and who they think is creating the problem.

The usual proposal is for a quota of state-educated pupils, but this is fundamentally unworkable. How does one explain to a 17-year-old whose parents made great sacrifices to buy the best possible education that for this reason alone she is less fit to attend a university for which she is otherwise qualified? Are all state schools to be treated as equal; the leafy Devonian grammar counting towards the same quota as the inner-city comprehensive? There are no easy answers. Any quota which could be created would, in any case, be rapidly circumvented by cunning parents and applicants. The addition of educational bureaucracy almost always ends up as a boon to those 'pushy parents' who have read the small print and know precisely what they have to do in order to be technically 'eligible' – look at the annual furore over school places, with people moving house temporarily, converting to Catholicism, joining PTAs and various other dodges in order to ensure a place for their child at a favoured school.

Talk of an 'old boy network' among dons is desperately outdated. Oxford's tutors are, on the whole, considerably to the left of their pupils, the majority came from grammar schools and were funded through their long educations by student grants. The Oxford admissions system is set up to be as difficult as possible to 'coach' applicants through. The subject-based aptitude tests which have been re-introduced in heavily modernised form over the last decade are supposedly un-teachable, based on unpredictable material and requiring no prior knowledge – indeed, some positively discourage it. Unfortunately, this has had absolutely no effect on the proportion of state pupils accepted, which has remained constant at around 45% for many years.

Preparation for interview is always touted as something independent schools excel at, thus helping their pupils shine in their total of around an hour in front of tutors. This is true. Top independent schools are far more likely than others to employ teachers who went to Oxbridge themselves and have far more time to prepare pupils. However, in the end we must trust the interviewers. These are the greatest experts on their subjects the world can offer (unlike some universities, Oxbridge interviews are always conducted by academics). If they cannot tell the difference between someone who is well-prepared and articulate but not quite up to the mark and someone who is neither of the former but highly talented, it probably cannot be done – and someone who is that well-prepared and articulate is liable to succeed at anything they choose. The faceless, straightforward UCAS-form-and-reference used by almost every other university in the UK is far less likely than interviews to accurately sort the wheat from the chaff - any fool can write, or have written for them, a convincing personal statement, and no school will give other than glowing references to a student expected to get straight As.

Oxford and Cambridge do far more than any other university to ensure that they receive the very best undergraduates, because it is to their advantage to do so. They do a very good job of selecting among the best of those who apply – there are too many applicants of too similar a very high standard to ensure that there are no mistakes, indeed there are many, but as few as human ingenuity and a Byzantine system of second, third and even fourth interviews can ensure. What is needed is to convince more people from 'non-traditional' backgrounds to apply; too many very bright people simply cannot conceive of themselves or their children ever getting to Oxford 'because people like us don't go there'. The universities are doing their best to dispel these illusions, because (I repeat) it is entirely in their interest to have the brightest and best. More could probably be done. Target Schools and its equivalents need to be better-run, better-funded and much, much better staffed. Instead of 50-odd volunteers, let us have 500 or 1500, paid and dispatched to every school in the country. It would be nice if the government which complains so much would chip in for this, though that is about as likely as Magdalen relocating to Blackbird Leys council estate.

In summary, the admissions system is just fine the way it is. Oxbridge is not broken, please don't fix it.

"Eccentricity is frowned upon at Cambridge; at Oxford it is a cult."

No disrespect intended to our Tab correspondent, Alex Lancelotti, but here is a 1951 Time article about the difference between Oxford and Cambridge. The source quoted, one Norman St. John-Stevas, is clearly convinced he has a teddy bear called Aloysius, but his delusions are charming nonetheless.

A quote:

• Cambridge, he found, "is a matter-of-fact, down-to-earth, sensible university. It is still defiantly progressive and somewhat less defiantly Protestant. Oxford ... is very much the city of dreaming spires, the home of lost causes, Catholic and conservative in its deepest roots...Architecturally, Cambridge is to Oxford what Paris is to Rome. In Cambridge, as in Paris, everything is on show, and the whole is laid out to the best advantage. Oxford, like Rome, abounds in beauty, but it is a hidden beauty that must be sought for.
  

You can read the entire article here.

The Baath is Back

The recent news that thirty-five Iraqi officials have been arrested for allegedly plotting a Baathist coup, serves as a necessary reminder of the real game on the ground in Iraq. Saddam Hussein, after all, did not spring fully formed as a dictator from the mind of the American electorate; he was coming from somewhere, after all, and regardless of the veracity of the story about attempts to reinstate the now-banned Baathist party or its reincarnation, Al Awda, it is useful to recall that in other times, in other contexts, Saddam was more than the second-scariest gremlin in the American imagination.

It is easy to forget that Saddam was more than a shadowy dictator to the East - he was a Baathist, and came to political prominence in the bosom of a party that combined left-leaning, even socialist, Western political philosophies with Arab nationalism - a tenuous intellectual fusion that opposed colonialism even as it owed ideological debts to its oppressors. As the de facto strongman behind the Iraqi branch of the party, Saddam was responsible for promoting this sense of nationalism, both Pan-Arab and purely Iraqi, in a country whose borders had been drawn haphazardly by the English without any regard to ethnic or religious divisions. His approach - in keeping with the fairly standard tradition of the Darwinian "military legitimacy" of the Middle East - was to enforce unity and stability at the cost of individuality. His achievements were twofold: he managed to maintain control of Iraq for decades, even as the years preceding his rule were marked by bloody coups and factional infighting, and thus stave off civil war. So too did he manage to perpetrate some of the most atrocious violations of human rights in recent memory.

The question of a final judgement on an authoritarian leader is a difficult one. Caesar Augustus is widely remembered as one of history's greatest rulers; Stalin will likely receive no such lauds. But as doubts, intrigue, suspicion, and all the other progenies of non-authoritarian Middle Eastern governments come into play, as questions are raised about the degree to which this plot was little more than an attempt to remove ex-Baathists from government for purely political purposes , we are inevitably reminded of the situation that led to the rise of Saddam: infighting in halls of power, dangerous liaisons, surreptitious removals of power, tensions between Shi'ite and Sunni, Arab and Kurd, coups, bombings, and bloodshed. The theocratic element, which no doubt owes something to increasing Shi'ite influence from a hawk-eyed Iran, complicates matters further this time around.

What happens next is uncertain. But the issues these latest arrests have brought up should be brought to the forefront of the national discussion on Iraq. The issues say much about the inherent instability of a country - the term nation almost seems inappropriate - as fraught with factionalism as this one. How did a party that began as an anti-colonialist movement end up being banned by the army of a western invader? And how, in the absence of a party successful, if nothing else, than in maintaining order and a sense of Iraqi nationalism, can Iraq avoid this kind of threatening machinations?

One almost wonders if we should mind Bismarck's apocryphal aphorism about the dirty necessities of government: "Laws are like sausages; it's better when you don't know how they're made."

The Sacrament of Gay Marriage?

Perhaps this is a bit belated, but nonetheless I feel the need to address Lisa Miller's Dec 6. Newsweek cover piece about the Biblical case for gay marriage, a proposition that disturbs me for a variety of reasons, theological and political alike.

Miller begins by criticizing the Bible's approach to romance - citing Old Testament polygamy, Jesus's celibacy, and Paul's lukewarm take on nuptial bliss as examples of why the text fails to stand up relevantly in the modern world.

• Would any contemporary heterosexual married couple - who likely woke up on their wedding day harboring some optimistic and newfangled ideas about gender equality and romantic love - turn to the Bible as a how to script? Of course not, yet the religious opponents of gay marriage would have it so..
  

This clear dichotomy between the relevant left (also responsible, according to Miller, for ending the subjugation of women, abolishing slavery, and a host of other virtuous accomplishments) and crotchety conservatives twirling their mustaches from the right continues throughout the piece, with Miller comfortably convinced that opponents to religious marriages for same sex couples - let alone secular ones - are the theological answer to crusty geriatrics hoping those new-fangled gays would get the hell off their lawn. The lessons of tolerance and inclusiveness preached in the Bible, Miller argues, mean that not only should Christians accept gays as part of their community, but also that the religious same-sex unions practiced by more liberal congregations are the only natural progression of "Christian values"

This sort of argumentation is worrisome for two reasons. First of all, it represents a basic lack of understanding of "Christian values," watering them down to a nebulous fuzziness more appropriate to bedtime stories than to intellectual grapples with faith. Certainly it goes without saying that, ideally, Christianity is a religion of love, of acceptance, and of other magnificent concepts similarly diluted by gratuitous bandying about. But the fulcrum of Christianity is the contrast - the degree to which man can debase and raise himself alike in his fatally flawed condition. If we are going to speak about "love" in a Christian context, we must say the degradation engendered by sin is as real, as present as the all-encompassing grace of God, which according to Christianity occurs in spite of our sins. In order for the mystery of God's grace to have any significance, it must coexist with human imperfection. The "tolerance" and "acceptance" Miller mentions are not denials of wrongdoing - in the case Miller cites of Jesus revealing himself to the woman at the well, the woman admits her sin and resolves to live well; Jesus loves her, but by no means encourages her to continue in her behavior. Miller's interpretation of "true" Christianity may go for the comfortable humanism of "do what feels right" - but it has the substance of cotton candy.

This is not to say, of course, that we should condemn homosexuality in any sort of secular or political context. Nor do I believe that homosexuality is in fact sinful. However, if we must, as Miller insists, view homosexuality from within a Christian context that cites the Judeo-Christian tradition, let alone the Bible, as a source, the only intellectually coherent and historically conscious response is to allow that perspective to be carried out to its natural conclusion. It is difficult, however, to take intellectual coherence seriously from an author who refers to the "fragile monotheism" of the "ancient Jews" or cites the Torah as speaking to the "Hebrews," centuries after the conquest of Canaan.

Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, is the question of why Miller feels the need to bring Christianity into the tribunal to witness her argument. By doing so, Miller places undue responsibility on religion itself. It must, Miller argues, respond to cultural needs by becoming increasingly progressive - terminology like "man and wife" has been replaced by the more politically correct "husband and wife," and the days of Jacob's polygamy have long since passed in much of the West. At the same time, religion is given the task of remaining a cultural arbitrator - even as followers are called to overlook or ignore parts of Scripture in the name of greater tolerance, it is somehow the job of religion to soothe the doubts of those who wish to align theological conservatism with political progressivism - an admirable, and not impossible task, but by no means as easy as Miller would have it be. Gay marriage may well be legalized as a civil, not religious, process. Homosexuality indeed ought to be widely accepted, and the disgusting acts of bigotry perpetrated against gays ought to be regarded with universal disgust. It is not the job of any religious sect, however, to "make" being gay "okay." If we want to break the near-theocratic hold of fundamentalist Protestant sects on the American government, it is vital that homosexuality and gay rights become a discussion that does not involve religion at all, regardless of whose side the Bible is deemed to be on. It is only by breaking the link between religion and politics altogether that we can find a solution to the endless standstill on the issue of gay rights - Miller need not force God further into the issue.

I do wish, however, Miller had spent more time on what I find to be one of the more interesting, and most convincing, arguments for gay marriage from a non-political perspective. Miller quotes CT Presbyterian pastor Terry Davis as arguing for gay marriage on the grounds of believing "family values" to be more precious - and threatened - a commodity than man-woman marriage. "I'm against promiscuity — love ought to be expressed in committed relationships, not through casual sex, and I think the church should recognize the validity of committed same-sex relationships," he says. The complexities of his argument seem to be too much for Miller, however, who immediately skips over to arguing that "If we are all God's children...then to deny access to any sacrament based on sexuality is exactly the same thing as denying it based on skin color."

Such a generalization overlooks the fact that most denominations take a clear moral line on "homosexual acts" - as distinguished from any state of being or attraction, and that extending the sacrament of marriage to same-sex couples (which we shall distinguish, naturally, from the legal status of non-religious marriage) is in direct violation of that ethos. I do not believe at all that any other sacrament should be denied to gays - whether celibate or in a committed same-sex relationship - as previously mentioned, so much the beauty of Christianity lies in the coexistence of sin and grace. But while the church can certainly extend its love to all its members, it is under an equal obligation to practice the very morality it seeks to enforce - it must temper its acceptance of its flock with an adherence to its standards stronger than can be expected of any individual member. Asking churches to extend the sacrament of marriage to same-sex unions would thus be requesting them to engage in a hypocritical repudiation of their own committment

Let it be mentioned that I myself am a supporter of gay marriage in the secular sphere. I do not believe, however, that shoehorning political correctness into established religious traditions, or in pressuring progressivism established institutions - who are well within their rights to believe in the acknowledged moral standards of their holy texts - will have any effect but to further the paradigm of a "guns, gays, and God" kulturkampf.

Andrew Sullivan makes the very salient point that Scriptural authority is a very tricky area, and perhaps not intellectually sustainable for the right. If so, however, there is no ground there for the left, either.

Welcome one and all...

To the Reverend Uncle and his comments on anything he likes. The original Reverend was Reverend Productions, a student theatre company in Oxford, which has now expanded to fund other ventures, said to be supported 'by one's Reverend uncle'.

It is becoming increasingly evident that this redoubtable gentleman has strong opinions on most everything under the sun, far beyond the Oxford theatre scene. This week he has mostly been exercised about The Phantom of the Opera, rail fares, Oxford's applications process and the Catholic Church, an institution nearly as venerable and august as the Reverend Taylor himself.