Otto Schenk’s Ring Cycle had profound impact at Metropolitan Opera

Schenk’s Ring Cycle had profound impact

NEW YORK — When Valhalla burns and crumbles near midnight on May 9, Otto Schenk’s production of Wagner’s Ring Cycle at the Metropolitan Opera will be retired.

“It’s still alive,” Schenk said before a rehearsal one morning — speaking of Wagner’s story, not his production, which entered the Met repertory from 1986 to ‘89.

“I wanted to tell a romantic old story, like starting with ‘Once upon a time,’” he said. “All the secrets of Wagner’s Ring should be guessed by the audience or found by the audience.”

Schenk received a huge ovation when he took a curtain call after the April 18 matinee performance of “Siegfried.” The longest and loudest applause was for music director James Levine and the orchestra.

Many are sad to see the end of Schenk’s romantic, realistic staging, with its river, forest and mountain sets by Guenther Schneider-Siemssen dominated by greens and oranges, and costumes by Rolf Langenfass. After two decades, however, the set is starting to fall apart. The production, which will remain visible on DVDs, forced a pronounced counterrevolutionary counterbalance to years of radical reinterpretations.

Wieland Wagner, one of the composer’s grandsons, junked the winged helmets that had become cliche by the time the Wagner family’s Bayreuth festival reopened after World War II with a stark 1951 production conducted by Herbert von Karajan and Hans Knappertsbusch that some viewers compared with Greek tragedy. Then, in 1965, Wieland Wagner and conductor Karl Boehm introduced a Freudian/Jungian interpretation at the Wagner family opera house.

For the centenary Ring in 1976, director Patrice Chereau and conductor Pierre Boulez radicalized Bayreuth with an industrial age Ring that was interpreted by some as Marxist. Wotan wore a smoking jacket, the Rhine is a hydroelectric dam and the Rhinemaidens were hookers.

Ever since then, loopy European productions have been commonplace.

Schenk was the great exception, one that followed the stage directions that Wagner wrote more than a century earlier.

“Wagner in his life gave no indication on what the Ring meant. He didn’t interpret,” Schenk said.

Some criticized his staging as lacking any overriding theme, and that was fine with him — and the audience. Thousands went to the Met from around the world to see a Ring directed in the manner Wagner intended, with a rainbow bridge in “Das Rheingold” and a billowing magic fire in “Die Walkuere.”

Schenk’s production failed to produce any great Bruennhildes or Siegfrieds, but that didn’t hamper its effectiveness. Of the three primary roles, only the Wotan of James Morris could be considered top rank. Taking over from Simon Estes, who sang the opening night “Die Walkuere” in 1986, Morris sang his Wotan from 1989 through this year, and while the power of his voice has diminished, the eloquence and passion of his portrayal have deepened.

Hildegarde Behrens, the primary Bruennhilde through 1997, made the role her own on acting ability. While she never had the biggest voice, she compensated by showing the giddy, emotional side of a god-turned-woman.

In “Siegfried,” though, the production was hampered by singers that were adequate at best and painful to hear at worst.

That’s not to say there weren’t stars coming through. Placido Domingo’s Siegmund and Deborah Voigt’s Sieglinde repeatedly thrilled. Christa Ludwig and Helga Dernesch gave noble accounts of Fricka. Matti Salminen was a fierce Hagen.

Already the Met is starting to promote the new Robert Lepage production, which starts with “Das Rheingold” on Sept. 27, 2010, with an opening-night gala. Bryn Terfel (Wotan), Voigt (Bruennhilde) and Ben Heppner (Siegfried) have been cast in the leading roles, and complete Rings are scheduled for the springs of 2012 and 2013, the 200th anniversary year of Wagner’s birth.

Based on “Ka,” Lepage’s show for Cirque de Soleil at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas, Lepage has the potential to create a visual triumph. But following Schenk’s important creation, the Met audience will have high expectations.

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