The Stage

The Lion’s Face

Published Wednesday 21 July 2010 at 11:13 by George Hall

The subject of dementia, once barely spoken about, has become increasingly prominent over recent years, and Elena Langer’s new opera, to a libretto by poet Glyn Maxwell, treats it in operatic form.

Elizabeth Sikora (The Wife), Rachel Hynes (The Caregiver) and Dave Hill (Mr D) in The Lion's Face Photo: Tristram Kenton

Premiered at the Brighton Festival in May, The Lion’s Face - named after the phenomenon of facial impassivity some observe in the features of sufferers - reaches London in its original production, designed by Alex Lowde and staged by the Opera Group’s artistic director, John Fulljames.

It’s a good-looking show, its straightforward set presenting the care home where the central character, Mr D - a speaking role, sensitively played by Dave Hill - is living. At the back we see not only the snow falling outside but disordered yet evocative images (designed by Ian William Galloway) from Mr D’s memory bank.

Other characters come and go - Elizabeth Sikora’s moving Mrs D, trying to deal with her husband’s condition, Benedict Nelson as the Clinician-Scientist who treats him, Rachel Hynes as the Caregiver, who brings her daughter to the home because she’s unable to afford a babysitter, and Fflur Wyn as the teenager herself, bored and mildly resentful.

Maxwell’s overly poetic libretto is more occluded than it need be. Although it is expertly presented by the cast, the piece remains fuzzy round every possible edge. Langer’s score, skilfully performed under conductor Nicholas Collon, is a patchwork of slender ideas, very few of which make any appreciable mark.