Abstract

Werktreue (faithfulness to the original) or Regietheater (director’s theatre) continue to be at the centre of discussion, in academia and journalism, of opera and theatre productions. Werktreue is defined as the extent to which the director is faithful to the original; related terms are traditional and orthodox. Regietheater is the apparent disregard for the original work: the director’s ideas in relation to the original work dominate production decisions; traditionalists are not able to see those decisions as resulting from, or as intrinsic to the work, but as superimposed arbitrarily on the work and thus artificial. Regietheater, however, is also considered as dynamic, associated with ideas, provocation and confrontation (Balme 43), whereas Werktreue can be regarded as a thing of the past, as fundamentalist in nature even if necessary for the discussion of opera and theatre (Balme 43). In the current debate, Regietheater and Werktreue are defined as binary opposites. This definition limits the usefulness of the concepts, rendering them unproductive and preventing further progress in understanding, and production practice, of opera and theatre.

The chapter is designed to reassess the current definitions of Werktreue and Regietheater with reference to selected 2010-12 productions of selected operas by Wagner. The resulting new definitions of Werktreue and Regietheater will, in the short term, end the stagnation in research and production practice caused by the traditional definitions of these concepts. Medium and long-term impacts include the reinvigoration of innovative, rigorous and original research into the performance of opera and theatre, and the launch a new wave of imaginative opera and theatre production practice.