Bliss, Opera Australia, Edinburgh Festival Theatre

Hotly anticipated new Australian opera is hoist by its absurdly trendy Leftist petard

by Igor ToronyilalicMonday, 06 September 2010

'The low was Peter Coleman-Wright's Harry, not unstable enough for a man enduring an earth-shattering mid-life crisis'

Here we go again. Art takes on capitalism, round 4,598,756. The blissful life of Harry Joy, ad exec extraordinaire, beloved father of two, is (surprise, surprise) not quite what it seems. His wife is having an affair, his daughter is fellating his son for drugs and his business clients are spreading cancer. He thinks he's in hell. But this ain't hell; it's the greedy, bourgeois reality of a capitalist West. Stalin would have been mighty proud of Australian Brett Dean's new opera, Bliss, which was receiving its European premiere at the Edinburgh International Festival.

Bliss isn't the best opera to go to with anyone who knows anything about the real world

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