THE SPECTATOR

London, England

5 September 1952

(pages 295-296)

CONTEMPORARY ARTS.

MUSIC.

Faust, which opened the autumn season at Sadlers Wells, is such a French Second Empire work that, for myself, I despair of a modern production. Faust must surely, at all costs, be a young cocodès, whose membership of the Jockey Club was Mephisto's first service; and Mephisto himself the smartest of boulevardiers. Any attempt to return more nearly to Goethe seems to me a major mistake and the Aleister Crowley ballet is surely a complete misconception. Joan Stuart made a pretty Marguerite and John Probyn, though a wooden and self-conscious actor, has a fine voice. Everyone else in the audience seemed to enjoy Faust enormously and perhaps my lack of enthusiasm is due to a blind spot, an occupational disease of all specialists and too historically minded persons.