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The main stage at the Royal Opera House allows ample space for bold, expansive productions (it doesn’t always get them). But if you’re looking for something more claustrophobic, more menacing, the smaller Linbury Theatre, deep beneath the main auditorium, is a better bet.
Claustrophobia and menace are plentiful in Benjamin Britten’s opera The Turn of the Screw; based (not slavishly) on Henry James’s novella, it fits the Linbury perfectly. Musically, it’s a tour de force of concision. The orchestra has just 13 (uncredited) players, but the score is so tightly wound that the music never feels thin: harp and celesta, instruments that can be soothing, here sound ominous and eerie.
