A beautiful boy walks onto a ship. One man wants to destroy him. Another can't save him.
John Dexter’s brilliant production of Britten’s searing opera stars Dwayne Croft in the title role of the handsome young sailor whose kindness and innocence cause his downfall. The great James Morris is Claggart, master-at-arms on the 18th-century warship Indomitable, who falsely accuses Billy of inciting a mutiny. Philip Langridge sings Captain Vere, the honest commander who knows that Billy is innocent but finds himself unable to save him. Steuart Bedford, Britten’s close collaborator during the last years of the composer’s life, is on the podium.
Acting
Morris's Claggart: velvet voice, pure malice, repressed everything
Direction
Dexter's stark ropes-and-wood staging traps them all
Score
Britten's sea music churns, then shatters into silence
Director
John Dexter
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
Melville's novella was unpublished at his death; Britten and librettist E.M. Forster had to build the opera from fragments, making Vere the moral center.
Britten wrote the role of Billy for his partner Peter Pears, then gave it to a baritone — the original production's erotic tension between tenor Vere and baritone Billy was deliberate.
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