Review: UC Opera’s production of Ernest Bloch’s Macbeth

UCOpera (UCO) relishes a challenge. Their current production of Ernest Bloch's Macbeth at the UCL Bloomsbury Theatre ' the British première of the opera ' is no exception. A minor classical masterpiece of the early twentieth century, Bloch's work was written while the composer was in his twenties and first played at the Opéra Comique in Paris in 1910, accompanied by rumours of bitter rivalries among the cast. There were no further productions until 1938, when it was revived in Naples but subsequently banned by Mussolini. It was only after World War II that the emergence of the neglected opera was possible in Europe. How, then, to carve out an interpretation from patchy documentation and no clear precedent? UCO has boldly opted for minimal stage design, acknowledging that the emotions and tensions of the story itself are costume enough. In their production, Shakespeare's tragedy unfurls on the stage against a livid sky, in turn malign and sombre.