American Lulu: eight nights at the Young Vic

Young Vic
66 The Cut, London, SE1 8LZ, UK
United Kingdom
020 7922 2922

Angel Blue
Jacqui Dankworth
Donald Maxwell
Robert Winslade Anderson
Jonathan Stoughton
Paul Curievici
Simon Wilding
Paul Reeves

John Fulljames director
Gerry Cornelius conductor
Magda Willi design
Finn Ross video
Guy Hoare light
Carolyn Downing sound design
Emma Woodvine dialect coach

Unfinished at his death in 1935, Alban Berg’s opera Lulu is a tantalising prospect for anyone grappling with its completion. Setting her own libretto Olga Neuwirth re-works the first two acts and composes an entirely original third, transporting Berg’s femme fatale to the smoky jazz clubs of 1950s America where Lulu, a young and aspiring dancer, finds herself at the mercy of some dark, predatory characters. As Lulu looks back at her life, scarred by its tumultuous events, she must come to terms with a sordid history of sex, murder and suicide.

A co-production between The Opera Group, Young Vic, Scottish Opera and Bregenzer Festspiele, in association with the London Sinfonietta.

Music of Act I and II adapted and reorchestrated by Olga Neuwirth
Text of Act I and II adapted by Olga Neuwirth and Helga Utz using translations into English by Richard Stokes and Catherine Kerkhoff-Saxon
Music and text for Act III by Olga Neuwirth and translated into English by Catherine Kerkhoff-Saxon

Alban Berg : Lulu