Bad news for the Liceu de les Arts. Wagner’s Tetralogy, staged by Romeo Castellucci and co-produced by La Monnaie in Brussels together with the Barcelona Lyric Coliseum, is in danger after the Belgian theater has decided to cancel the last two titles, leaving the project half finished. The Liceu is thus left alone in charge of an important budget project, so if it does not find another co-producing theater in record time that wants to join, there is the possibility that it will withdraw and not even reach show Gold of the Rhine and The Valkyrie that have already seen the light of day in Belgium. Goodbye to what was going to be the culmination of the new artistic stage of the Gran Teatre?
The reasons for this unusual cancellation must be sought in a host of circumstances that have led to the perfect storm: on the one hand, as the Belgian opera has made public today, the Italian theater director would have increased the budget with respect to what was originally proposed, but The thing is that he has also asked to delay the release date of Siegfried, the third installment, which would already be impossible even for Peter de Caluwe, the artistic director of La Monnaie who so appreciates the unique regista. In fact, the delay in the delivery of a Wagner by Castellucci was already experienced by Brussels when he invited him to debut with a Parsifal.
To finish complicating everything, De Caluwe has had to think twice before bequeathing to his imminent replacement in the position, Christina Scheppelmann, a project with a disproportionate budget. The German director who was in charge of the Liceu until 2019 has been chosen to correct the accounts of La Monnaie, a theater that in recent decades has been at the forefront of new operatic creation and unexpected and advanced productions at its disposal. time.
In the midst of all this, the Liceu has come forward, ensuring that it is studying possible scenarios. “Continuing with Castellucci would be the first of them,” Víctor García de Gomar assures La Vanguardia. “Only if it is not possible to go alone in this Tetralogy would we have to consider alternatives,” adds the artistic director of the Liceu, who reiterates his appreciation and fascination for the universe that Romeo Castellucci has created for this Ring, “and in everything what are you doing”.
Taking into account the necessary advance notice with which the main opera theaters in the world work, the solution to find an alternative travel companion should be found by the Liceu within a year, at most. It is not clear that the Teatro Real, where Castellucci has already premiered Schönberg’s Mosses und Aron (angrying animal defenders for planting a bull in the middle of the scene), is going to be a possibility, since he has just made the Tetralogy which was signed by Robert Carsen.
