Seattle Opera presents: The Turn Of The Screw, or How To Alarm Your Audience

My favorite book that I read as part of my high school curriculum was the classic Victorian ghost novel, The Turn of The Screw by Henry James, which really should tell you everything you need to know about me. I've always loved a mystery, and the ending of this story leaves much to be explained.

A few weeks before opening night, Wagner and More (WAM), another Seattle Opera group, kindly invited Bravo members to a screening of Jack Clayton's' The Innocents which is the perfect preview for the opera. Starring the lovely Deborah Kerr as the governess who is seemingly in every shot, The Innocents is a close adaptation of the stage play of the same name by William Archibald, which is an adaptation of the Henry James novel, The Turn of the Screw. Think: black and white. Think: creepy children whispering 24/7. Hear: lots of screaming and breathy crying from Debby. Whereas the stageplay of The Innocents stands firm on the idea that the governess is truly eradicating evil, Truman Capote was brought in to further develop the screenplay to support Clayton's vision of an open ending. Similar to the experience of the reader, the viewer is left wondering how much of what they've been told (all from the governess' perspective) is real. Which truth do we believe? Do we shrug along with the housekeeper in her gentle resignation to the governess' mania? No one else admits to seeing the spirits that the governess finds so real. Are we all willfully ignoring events outside of the natural world because they're too terrible to process and accept?  Is Myles a sociopath to the point where he pushes his governess far beyond her soft nature to the brink of madness where she believes him to be possessed by a large, handsome, dangerous man. Capote was encouraged to add in Freudian elements, where our sweet daughter of small town pastor, feels "sexual repression". I'll admit, I missed most of that while watching the movie, except for two Myles/Gibbons awkward mouthkisses which a. I firmly do not remember from the book, and b. were the reason why The Innocents received an "X" rating when it premiered in Britain in 1961.

The opera takes the story in the opposite direction. Where The Innocents played up the drama underneath the surface, the Benjamin Britten version brought out the ghosties for everyone (except the housekeeper) to see. A six (6!!) person cast brought the story to life/death, and there was a similarly small orchestra. The genius (and mild deterrent) to the plot is that it begins very slowly. The opera opens with many minutes of exposition, and then a slow train ride song relaxes the audience into a gentle stupor. The young governess is expressing dismay at her life choices but regains her determination after about five entire minutes of dithering. You feel for her but at the same time, GIRL GET ON WITH IT. When we arrive at the house, the set begins to move (along with our interest levels). A huge stone house is projected onto a wall which suddenly sprouts stairs and doors. Using projections to build the setting enhanced the dreamlike quality of this story where nothing is truly tangible. The audience gasped in delighted alarm when the ghosts of Peter Quint and Miss. Jessel appeared, and indeed, they were very creepy and disconcerting. Singing to and with the children (Miss Jessel gets a voice in the opera, which is a nice change from her silently glaring from the weeds for all of The Innocents), the audience observes the children directly reacting to the ghosts, therefore supporting the poor governess in her suspicions. The opera directly references an inappropriate relationship between Myles and Peter Quint, and Miss. Jessel is able to express her reason behind the haunting of the children. The movie showed Miss Jessel as a passive, weak woman, who fell in love with a bad man. The opera ghost is Mad About Things, and is happy to enact her own revenge on someone smaller than her. The opera ends with Myles dying as usual, and the governess crumples as she realizes she has failed. She is holding his body as she cries, and THEN HE COMES ROLLING ACROSS THE STAGE DOWN BELOW HER AS A GHOST WITH THE BIGGEST SMIRK and the audience panicked. It was really a well done transition, very few people anticipated that the body on the landing would be switched out when the alcove was blocked off for a moment. (No brag, but I've been in and around theaters all my life, and there is very little done onstage that is not intentional, and I knew the body had been changed. I did not expect the ghost version of Myles to come rolling out on the stage standing next to his desk with a very mature look for a young boy.) Side note, we were all immensely uncomfortable when Myles came down the stairs as soon as he and the governess were alone, and he had his shirt half unbuttoned and was dressed like a man looking for trouble. Children who act like adults are almost as alarming as children who act like dolls.

Speaking of dolls, Flora and her rag doll wore matching outfits and spent all their time whispering in each other's ears. The audience thought very little of that other than the mild concern that comes from seeing small girls in matching outfits in an old house. However, Miss Jessel emerged with her own matching doll and then our adrenaline spiked. The ghost and the young girl played with their dolls in identical movements, and then Miss Jessel started whispering in her dolls ear, and Flora started listening to HER doll. Soraya Mafi beautifully played the tortured young girl who spent time scrambling around like any child, and yet spent moments frozen with a terror that sent a chill over the audience member who happened to glance at her. The opera, more than the movie or the book, provides a personality to the ghosts and gives the audience insight as to their motives. Flora is the most innocent one of the whole story, watching her beloved governess be seduced and abused, and having her brother learning how to treat women and the world from the same man. The ghosts come alive when the children take on the roles of their mentors, leaving poor Flora fighting the demons of a woman who didn't protect her.


I'm going to have to go back and listen to the opera again and again, as the music (similar to the Inception concept) is one piece of music that speeds up and up as the governess is wound tighter and tighter in her horror. It also brings the audience closer and closer to the edges of their seats as they wait for the answers which will never come. The orchestra did a wonderful job of providing an undercurrent of tension. Unconsciously, we were all being drawn deeper into the story, even as we rejected the evidence of our eyes.

The flexibility of the ending is what makes this story so fascinating. People can (and have) analyzed it every which way, and there is no true answer to the riddle. Do the ghosts exist? Are they evil spirits who are actively haunting the house? Are they trapped in the hearts of children who spent too much time with a cruel man and will never be truly free of him? Or is the governess having her own mental break? (I'm no doctor but she's supposed to be in her early twenties, and I believe that's when people can start showing symptoms of schizophrenia...) We truly will never know for sure, and that's just the way Henry James wants it.