Isabelle Kettle’s new production of Britten’s 1954 chamber opera for Bath’s Ustinov Studio is properly haunting. Based on Henry James’s novella about orphaned children whose governess believes them to be prey to malign influences, it is a horror story which becomes a tragedy. The claustrophobia of the Ustinov’s tiny black box of a space is ideal for the work’s dark sense of enclosure, even if the grandeur of the Bly country house can only be suggested by the expanse of transparent backdrop as window.
The many scheduled performances demand double-casting, but tonight’s cast of six could hardly be stronger, the key roles of Flora and Miles played by Maia Greaves and Oliver Michael, whose dramatic gifts and musical poise are simply astonishing. It is they who colour the attention-holding stage business with which Kettle cleverly supports the instrumental variations between scenes, with playful, childish games sometimes carrying a sinister edge, notably when the corpse of a dead crow must be ritually buried. The set’s single austere column also affords them hidden climbing foot-holds, a further nerve-wracking element.
