Welsh National Opera had to abandon tonight’s performance when the stage safety curtain jammed.
The company offered a concert alternative, but many disappointed operagoers queued hours for refunds.
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Obviously it wasn’t ideal. But in fact the performance was not abandoned. Welsh National Opwera (sic) performed all three operas in front of the curtain to a warm and receptive audience.
You would enjoy the opera film Meeting Venus.
Who are the Welsh, anyway? A people serious about their opera, coin, and located somewhere in the UK.
I think you need to be far more respectful about our Welsh family of the UK than write such an ignorant comment as a ‘guest’. Don’t even have the courage even a proper name to show such ignorance about a country and it’s lovely people.
Yeah, lovely, just so long as you look, walk and talk like them.
Which statement is “ignorant”: (a) serious about opera, (b) serious about coin, (c) located somewhere in the UK. If they wait in line hours for a refund rather than attend a concert (a) and (b) are true. They are in the UK. Get a sense of humor, and don’t take a jab so personally.
I was there last night. Carlo Rizzi made a charming little speech before the performance got underway, offering a refund or tickets for another performance, but most where we were sitting stayed and watched the singers perform in front of the curtain.
Musically it was a good performance but without the spectacle of the opera. It was well worth staying. Suor Angelica worked well.
I feel sorry for WNO – thanks to ACE and the Welsh Government the musicians are facing pay cuts. I thought that most of the audience were supportive.
Yes
But elsewhere on the tour they’re giving concert performances due to the cuts
Three sets to tour…not practical or affordable
No we’re not!
Hopefully they were as these accidents do happen, even in the fine Welsh theatre. WNO doesn’t need any more bashing up.
If you get a refund from the theatre you can then donate it straight to WNOZ
Yes. They’ve taken everyone’s details to contact them
It’s the fault of the theatre and maintenance of its facilities. Not the WNO whose artists could do without this on top of the Arts Council’s 15% cut in their incomes
Accidents happens in every theatre if you’ve ever worked in one as I have Look what happened in 2011 when the sets got stuck. Hardly lack of maintenance.
Doesn’t the safety curtain use a standard medium heavy duty electric motor with standard parts? Why was it down before the show and not in the interval when it is normally lowered to comply with licensing regulations?????
2011 sets getting stuck were at the Met and the new Ring.
The adverts on SD are getting more and more numerous. I feel bombarded, forever clicking to get rid of them.
Not a good look – and they trivialise the site.
We are working on the issue.
I have 7 different ADs on my page atm…
Get a lot of trouble with adverts, no comments, and ‘bad request’ messages whilst reading on Google Chrome but not reading whilst reading on Microsoft Edge.
I’m just wondering what the non-Welsh members of the audience did?
We came down from
London for this. We’ve extended our stay to see it on Saturday
In the early 1980s, motors running the fire curtain at Lyric Opera Chicago (civic opera house) broke. In Chicago, because of some terrible theater fires in the early 1900s, the curtain must be lowered if any scene change, etc., takes more than 15 minutes. So at Fidelio, after Act II scene 1, the curtain came down during the Leonore #3 and immediately, inch by slow inch, was hauled up by hand, and it took the whole of the intermezzo to do it.
Accidents will occasionally happen during all manner of performances in theatres. I was at a performance of Thea Musgrave’s excellent Mary Queen of Scots in Stuttgart in the mid-1970s when suddenly the safety curtain descended rather quickly during one of Mary’s arias. No explanation was later given but thankfully it slowly rose again after only a few seconds. Conductor, orchestra and cast coped admirably by just continuing during the hiatus.
On a rather similar note, I was at a La Scala performance of the wonderful Strehler production of Simon Boccanegra in Tokyo a decade or so later. Then it was half the pit lights that went out. Leaning over I could see Claudio Abbado almost begging the musicians to continue, which they did for the 30 seconds or so it took before the lights came back on.
Almost entirely wrong!
The announcement was: refund or FREE ticket for Saturday (the last performance of the run).
Many of us watched this performance AND came back on Saturday to see it properly.
The performance was not abandoned. It went ahead partially-staged, some action but constrained by being in front of the curtain line.
About 10% of the Circle left at the start and some others after a few minutes. If I had lived nearby I would have too. Presumably almost all came back for Saturday as it was packed.
Who queued for hours? I queued for less than 10 minutes and the ushers were encouraging people to email the box office rather than wait.
All in all, given the problem was not fixable on the day, WMC handled it as well as they could.
So well done to NL for giving WNO some publicity, but the original piece was hopelessly out.
How about mentioning Carlo Rizzi’s speech at the end, Wales is a nation of culture (pity about England).