Opera North: Peter Grimes Review | The Lowry | Manchester
- Frances
- 11 minutes ago
- 2 min read
After a small fishing community on the coast of England is rocked by the news of a child dying at sea, all fingers point to the elusive Peter Grimes, who is forced to fight back a wave of accusations in Benjamin Britten’s biting 1945 opera.
The Lowry audience is soaked in a tale of tragedy as director Phyllida Lloyd forms a dark and intimate portrait of Peter Grimes (John Findon), offering an insightful opera that examines empathy, ambition and mob mentality. When the reclusive outsider, Grimes and his apprentice fail to both come back from their fishing trip, Grimes is charged with the boy's murder and put on trial. Yet despite being cleared of murder, Grimes finds that the community have poisoned the well, labelling him a traitorous stranger to the village and leaving the audience to question whether or not he was actually at fault.
Under the cover of community, the group strikes to hand out vigilante justice, which alongside Lloyd’s mystic set, leads to an intense and all-encompassing production, including sweeping scenes and a towering chorus. As Findon delves into vulnerable and revealing arias from Grimes’s perspective as an unwanted other, the opinionated townspeople come together to reckon with their loss as a piercing, forceful collective or in eerie communal whispers. It is clear that the town does not take well to strangers and at one point in the production, the ensemble aims their cries directly at the audience, which is hard not to take personally.
The only empathy for the fisherman comes from his relationship with Ellen Orford (Natalya Romaniw), whose gentle character and thoughtful demeanour lead to her unearthing more of Grimes’s unspoken hopes and desires. Romaniw’s aria Embroidery in Childhood allows the opera a moment of quiet reflection of a loss of innocence, with Romaniw’s lulling performance and Montagu Slater absorbing lyrics taking a step back from the drama. This production is sung in English, making it the perfect entry to Opera for newcomers. However, this ravenous tale is fuelled by raw and powerful performances that merge Findon’s simmering rage with the explosive judgement of the chorus. As both Grimes and the community feel the constant pressure of living with a perceived threat to their way of life, one side snaps under the pressure with devastating consequences.
Conductor Gary Walker and the Opera North orchestra ground the piece in the environment, immediately connecting audiences to the cold, coastal and unforgiving landscape. Alongside the thunderous drums and trumpets, there is no sugar-coating Lloyd’s strikingly atmospheric and minimalist set that leaves Grimes in a cruel solitude, under blue-drenched lighting that blends the ensemble into its scenery. Lloyd keeps the ever-present threat of the chorus by having the tight-knit community emerge onstage united in crowds and forming together under a sea net as a haunting presence.
Packed full of turbulent and compelling performances from the ensemble and Findon, Opera North’s Peter Grimes allows the audience to second guess the authenticity of its protagonist, in a daring allegory around oppression and alienation.
Tickets are available via the Lowry link