Harry here and in the tradition of Mr Godfather and Chuck Jones, Lars Von Trier is going to adapt Wagner's THE RING OF NIEBELUNG, but as the full opera and on stage... not for film unfortunately! Read below about the hows and whys and see it if you can, should be magnificient!!!!
Hello Harry,
Long time reader and semi-avid fan, first-time contributor. It's about time.
So while I was surfing the international media looking for the latest Champion's League results, I came upon an article in the Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet. Now, since it's in Danish, I can only give a loose translation of the content. But the main gist of the piece was that :
Vibeke Vendeloev, one of the producers over at Zentropa films has stated in a press release that von Trier is going to present a new version of Wagner's "The Ring of Niebelung" at some opera festival in Bayreuth, Germany.
Both Vendeloev and von Trier were at this year's festival in Bayreuth, and the final deal was arranged earlier this week in Copenhagen after a meeting with festival head Wolfgang Wagner and composer Christian Thieleman.
Speaking to the Ritzau news bureau, Vendeloev said that this is von Trier's first excursion into the opera genre. He's allegedly already working on a few ideas for his version, and is will get together with Thieleman in the near future to go over musical arrangements. Thieleman will be scoring von Trier's reworking of the opera.
The full opera is supposed to be one Wagner's chief musical work, consisting of the operas "Siegfried," "Gotterdammerung," and "Flight of the Valkyries." (Or something -- I'm an opera ignorant, so I'm sure some talkbacker will flog me with a soggy noodle and school me on the topic). In addition to composer Thieleman, von Trier will be working with the Icelandic scenographer Karl Juliusson, who's worked with von Trier in the past.
Wolfgang Wagner (yes, he IS related), was quoted by the DPA news agency saying that he wanted an artist with a unique vision for the restaging of "The Ring of Niebelung." "The work of von Trier that I'm familiar with has impressed me," he says.
The article finished with the little known revelation that von Trier has been toying with the idea of doing opera for years, allegedly expressing a desire to stage Wagner's work during the Cannes festival back in '98. The opera, however, won't be premiered until 2006. Von Trier's gotta make "Dogville" first.
Now, how a Dane will end up reemagining the work of a German is beyond my wildest imagination.
But at least I found out that Bayern Munich rocked Sparta Moscow 5-1.
later,
nick
"The life of a coder is very similar to that of a hermit. Except, of course, that the hermit can't do shadebobs."
- Author Unknown
p.s. Kickass work on the site. Love the fact that I can recite the plot of every Buffy episode to my ex-girlfriend 10 minutes before the show starts.
p.p.s. To double check, or for the .05% of your readers that can read Danish, here's the link: CLICK HERE
