Short Summary
"Evil knows about good, but good does not know about evil."
This quote from Franz Kafka would be an apt subtitle for Britten's Billy Budd. The satanic officer Claggart succeeds in making the angelic and therefore guileless sailor Billy Budd, who is loved by everyone, innocently guilty and thus destroyed.
Storyline
Captain Edward Fairfax Vere is an old man. He remembers the time of the coalition wars against France: in 1797, the year of the great mutinies, as commander of the warship Indomitable, he made a huge, irreparable mistake ...
The work is hard on a large warship whose crew is largely made up of forced recruits from various social classes. The particular unrest among the men stems from the recent mutinies of Spithead and Nore, where inhumane treatment by the officers has led to an uprising among the crew. Tensions are highlighted when Mr. Flint, the navigation officer, and the boatswain, exercise their authority and sentence a newcomer to 20 lashes for a carelessness. A recruiting party is returning from a draft. John Claggart, the master-at-arms, inspects the three new recruits.
The first, Red Whiskers, protests against his forcible recruitment and is beaten up by Claggart. The second, Arthur Jones, is intimidated by them. Only the young Billy Budd is looking forward to life on a large warship. With his good looks, freshness and spontaneity, he immediately wins everyone's heart. He has only one fault: whenever he gets excited, he falls into a convulsive stutter. Billy Budd is assigned to duty on the forecourt. This is more than he expected. He cheerfully bids farewell to his former ship: "Farewell, Rights o' Man!" Everyone is deeply irritated.
The French Revolution made the word "human rights" a provocation for the royalist English and for sailors it was synonymous with mutiny. Claggart is instructed by the suspicious officers to keep an eye on Billy Budd. He forces Squeak, who is in bondage to him, to secretly rummage through Billy's belongings in order to provoke him. The newcomer is brought back on deck after the flogging. Billy is disturbed by this senseless brutality. He is warned about the insidious Claggart. Captain Vere addresses his crew with a rousing speech to prepare them for battle. The men are ready to go through fire for their captain. Billy is also enthusiastic: "I'd give my life for you, Star Vere!" he exclaims. With his enthusiasm, he becomes a figure of identification for everyone.
Captain Vere has retired to his cabin to read and think. He invites the leading officers Mr. Redburn and Mr. Flint to join him and drinks with them to victory against France. The two warn him about Billy Budd, who has been talking loudly about "human rights" and is possibly planning a mutiny. But Vere is convinced that this boy poses no danger. When enemy land is sighted, the officers leave the captain alone. Billy discovers Squeak tampering with his duffel bag. A fight breaks out between Billy and Squeak. Claggart separates the two. Cold as ice, he has Squeak put in chains. Left alone, Claggart drops his mask: He is filled with envy and hatred of all that is good and beautiful.
Young Billy has all the sympathy, but he himself can only force the services of the others by force. Now that Squeak has failed, he chooses the unfortunate newcomer to destroy Billy Budd. He is to persuade Billy to become the leader of a fictitious mutiny. The frightened newcomer carries out Claggart's order. When he wakes the sleeping Billy and offers him the gold Claggart has given him, Billy begins to stutter again. It only goes away when Billy is able to tell his friend, old Dansker, everything. Dansker knows that only Claggart can be behind this. Billy doesn't want to believe it, he expects a promotion: the master-at-arms has praised him in front of the whole crew.
The Indomitable is stranded in thick fog. Claggart begins his diabolical intrigue: he warns the captain of a danger from within his own ranks.
However, the conversation is interrupted because an enemy ship has been sighted. The crew feverishly prepares a cannon attack. Under pressure from the officers, Vere hastily fires a shot at the enemy ship. However, the attack fails because it is too far away. It was all in vain. Claggart and Captain Vere continue their conversation, and the master-at-arms accuses Billy Budd of being a paid instigator. Disgusted, Vere demands that Claggart repeat this accusation in Billy's presence.
Billy comes to Vere. But instead of a promotion, he is stunned by Claggart's accusation. His stuttering prevents him from defending himself. He can only help himself with a punch, which immediately causes Claggart to fall to the ground dead. The shaken Captain Vere is convinced of Billy's innocence. Nevertheless, he summons his officers to bring Billy Budd to justice. In times of war, the punishment can only be Death by hanging. Vere himself informs Billy of the verdict.
Billy expects to die. He learns from Dansker that the crew wants to free him. But Billy is ready to die. The crew gathers to carry out the sentence. At the last moment, Billy calls out: "Star Vere - God save you!" Shaken, the crew repeats the exclamation. There is a murmur after the sentence is carried out. But the captain's personality causes the mutiny to collapse.
In the epilogue, old Vere realizes that he has wrongly condemned Billy. But Billy's forgiveness has redeemed him. He makes peace with the memory.
In this production, director Willy Decker recreates the oppressive atmosphere on board a warship during the Napoleonic Wars in Wolfgang Gussmann's historicizing costumes and impressive, deliberately concise stage sets, in whose cramped cosmos the question of justice, love and forgiveness is poignantly negotiated.
Britten's musico-dramatic conception is - despite the completely different vocal and instrumental means - closest to that of the late Verdi. Britten adhered to the classical practice of separate numbers, in which the emotional movement arising from the dramatic situation is captured at specific moments. In addition, Britten placed particular emphasis on the fluid connection and atmospheric summary of the self-contained parts. Britten's music gains its most individual expression in the orchestral coloration of the tonal language and in the colorful harmonic changes.
