Re: Act Studies in Musical Theatre Volume 2 Number 1 © 2008 Intellect Ltd Miscellaneous. English language. doi: 10.1386/smt.2.1.101/7 Detached signifiers, dead babies and demon dwarves: Bieito’s Dutchman 1 Kara McKechnie University of Leeds Abstract The Catalan director Calixto Bieito is a successful opera director, critically acclaimed for his often violent and confrontational concepts. He has worked mainly on German stages in the last decade, where audiences have often been scandalized by the explicit imagery and radical re-interpretations in Bieito’s work. This ‘reactive’ review critiques his production of The Flying Dutchman for Stuttgart State Opera (2008), applying mainly semiotic and some phenome- nological analysis. It also contextualizes Regietheater (director’s theatre) with audience expectation. The context of the production and the impact of using an earlier (1841) version of the opera is examined with reference to direction, scenography and conceptual updating of The Flying Dutchman. When you go to the opera, you want to feel the energy. It’s about energy, like at a bullfight. (Bieito in Beyer 2007: 124, my translation) 2 Although the Catalan director Calixto Bieito is talking here about the energy onstage, his new production of Richard Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman at the Staatsoper Stuttgart created energies similar to a bullfight amongst its viewers. Though it can be distracting, the feeling of polariza- tion certainly raises the emotional temperature in the auditorium, felt even after the first night, when protest and acclaim had been reported as noisy and confrontational. At this, the third performance (2 February 2008), sarcastic laughter was projected at images on stage; even more extrovert audience members chose the quiet introduction to the Dutchman’s first aria to declare they had had enough and walked out, slamming the door. Come the end, though, surprisingly, no booing was heard. This lack of protest, despite tangible dislike of the production, may be to do with a different emotional temperature having developed during the second half of the evening. I am going to argue in this reactive article that, while Bieito often practises a style of detached signifiers (i.e. a semiotic signifier that has very little connection with what it signifies, or normally signifies), and is always looking to develop his ‘surreal language’ further (see Beyer 2007: 127), he follows the emotional curve Wagner sets out in The Flying Dutchman. I will 101 SMT 2 (1) pp. 101–108 © Intellect Ltd 2008 1. I would like to thank the press office at Staatsoper Stuttgart (Frau Meyer and Frau Peitz) for their generous permission to reproduce the image used in this article (copyright of Sebastian Hoppe). My thanks and appreciation are also due to Harry Rowohlt for his translation of Bernstein’s poem spe- cially for this article. 2. ‘Wenn Du in die Oper gehst, willst du die Energien spüren. Es geht um Energien, wie bei einem Stierkampf ’. Keywords Richard Wagner The Flying Dutchman Calixto Bieito Stuttgart State Opera interpretation semiotics