Punch drunk after the Kirov Siegfried

Casual conversation overheard in one of the dimmer recesses of my own mind:

“I went to a performance of the Ring in Fingenbüttel, Ruritania.”

“What was that like?”

“Same old same old. Gods in powdered periwigs, silk waistcoats and knee-breeches, the ladies in panniers with bare breasts; Sieglinde as a waitress in Hunding’s restaurant, serving Siegmund at the one (candlelit) table (Hunding dressed as a maitre d'); valkyries as scantily-clad Ziegfeld girls descending a staircase in excessively elaborate headdresses. The bear danced a tango with Siegfried; then when he tried it with Mime, Mime screamed and the bear ran off stage. The twilight of the gods was sort of a video game with lots of space aliens shooting down deities.”

“How was the dragon?”

“Chinese New Year -- lots of people in lots of colored paper. Nothing special.”

“I’ve never seen a Ring with a really good dragon.”

“Siegfried lay underneath it and shoved his sword upwards, tearing the paper.”

“Cute.”

“And for the Rhine, they somehow managed to project a film of a tank full of tropical fish, and the Rhinemaidens sort of interacted with it. No idea how that worked.”

“But could they sing?”

“Well … the Alberich was okay ….”