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'Let me read you this
from the Dresdner Anzeiger

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'of February 14th, 1883-

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"'A heavy and altogether unexpected
bereavement has befallen musicians

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"'of every race, country and degree.

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"'We learn by telegraph from Venice

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"'that the greatest
of contemporary composers,

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"'Richard Wagner,
the second husband of Cosima Liszt,

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"'died there at four o'clock
of yesterday afternoon.

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"'He occupied a loftier station

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"'than King or Kaiser, Pope or President.

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"'No monarch was ever more
enthusiastically served

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"'than has been Richard Wagner.

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"'Lnfallibility, embodied in a Roman pontiff,

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"'has never been more implicitly believed in

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"'by the most orthodox Catholic

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"'than it has been in the person of the...

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"'Bayreuth Prophet!"

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'Put well, do you not think?

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'Put well. '

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'It goes on, it goes on -

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"'Time and space fail us even to make
passing reference to the literary labours

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"'with which his busiest years
were in great part occupied.

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"'A free thinker in matters religious,

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"'a democrat in matters political,

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"'of a surpassingly combative temperament,

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"'Wagner could scarcely fail
to involve himself

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"'in the revolutionary agitations of 1848,

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"'in Dresden, where he held
some minor musical appointment. "

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'Minor!

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'Ln the light of Wagner's future, perhaps,

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'but Kapellmeister to King Friedrich
August II of Saxony was a post!

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'To those of us here
in Dresden, a respected post.

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'Lrksome to have to visit the King
in his castle at Pillnitz,

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'a song in one's pocket,

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'to have to make music
in praise of one of those very princelings

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'one's political soul cried out against...

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'But that was the condition of Germany
in the 19th century.

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'Lnsignificant city states.

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'And it was a post! '

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Lüttichau...

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Majesty?

50
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Who's responsible for this noise?

51
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Reissiger conducted the piece,

52
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and it was got together by Herr Wagner,
Your Majesty.

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- Wagner?
- Wagner.

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Very well conducted, the piece.

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Herr who? Herr who?

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- Reissiger.
- Oh... oh.

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I lay myself at your feet, Majesty.

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The piece does have within it
some not inconsiderable...

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'Very well composed, Herr Wagner.

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00:10:02,840 --> 00:10:05,470
'Very well arse-licked, Herr Reissiger.

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"'Oh, do you think so,
Majesty, do you think so?

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"'I did do my best. '

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"Then I do dash myself under your feet,
dash myself twice. "

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It's different every time he relates it.
We were not late. As if I'd allow him to be!

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Hm? Hm?

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There sat I, paws up, tail wagging,

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waiting for a pat on the head
from von Lüttichau,

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begging to have gold put into my mouth

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rather than into the mouth and tooth
of His Majesty.

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But what does it matter? It is the path
of the liveried servant here in Saxony.

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In the event I said thank you
and gave my royal master the lot again.

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But so moved my army in its retreat,

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my Grande Armée of ill-disciplined
musical invalids and veterans,

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so moved them, cajoled,
nudged, shoved, willed them,

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the whole manoeuvre so steadily executed,

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thanks to my unexampled activity,

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that Reissiger never even knew we had left
until von Lüttichau told him so.

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The last notes falling on an echoing dream

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on the royal ulcerated
tooth and ear... mm?

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'Wasn't wasted though.
Later used it all in Tannhäuser... mm? '

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Wagner! Wagner!

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There is something to being
German altogether curious, you know.

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We can take a song like
Among The Meadows And Woods,

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and set it to music in such a manner
that we all dissolve in tears.

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And yet when we look about us and see,
instead of a united fatherland,

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a hotchpotch
of 34 kingdoms and principalities,

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we are unmoved.

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Our eyes remain dry,

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our hearts do not beat faster by one note.

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Why? Why?

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Are we little people with minuscule minds,

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mere servants, ruled by
and subservient to our "betters"?

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I say to them, our rulers, I say,

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cast your titles and distinctions from you!

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We too, the common people,
have ancestors.

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And though they had no titles,

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were not ushers of the shithouse.

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Their deeds of daring, their vassalage,

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their sufferings,

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are writ reeking in letters of blood!

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Their blood,

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our blood banner!

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Two camps have arisen in Europe.

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The cry from one is "Republic",

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00:14:02,400 --> 00:14:05,630
the cry from the tents of the other
is "Monarchy".

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Monarchy?

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00:14:07,880 --> 00:14:12,790
What do you see? You see
a blinded and corrupt tribe,

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the rulers of Hessen,

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Bavaria,

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Prussia!

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I agree!

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What then of our own king?

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I, his Kappellmeister, dare say this to him -

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become a prince who heeds our advice,

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banish the snivelling Junkers
and their swooning dames.

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Consult instead the free folk,
the German folk,

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those noblest of children

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like unto gods.

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Not servants in livery

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or slaves of whim,

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but elected and free.

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Every man with a vote.

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Our minds strengthened
by understanding of our past,

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the myths and legends and religion

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of Germany.

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Let him, our King, let him say,
"I declare Saxony a free state. "

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Let him rid himself of his sycophants,

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and if he will not, a word of warning,
as Christ says,

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"If thy right hand offend thee, cut it off!"

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Cut it off!

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Cut it off!

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Your fatherland is called Germany.

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Love it above all, and more through action
than through words.

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Germany must have its place in the sun!

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I've read your husband's latest scheme
for an opera, Frau Wagner, Lohengrin.

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Yes, the Poem of the Swan Knight.

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Oh, how wonderful! A swan knight.

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I can see all the little elves and fairies
dancing before my eyes.

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Unfortunately we can't give it.

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These unsettled times, your husband writes
to the newspapers, Frau Wagner,

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makes speeches he ought not to make.

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The King himself has had to prevent
one of his officers

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from challenging your husband to a duel.

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Lohengrin, it is stirring
and German and wonderful.

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If only Herr Wagner were not determined
on setting it to music himself.

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Meser! Why do you remove my Tannhäuser
from your window, all the copies?

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Is my work not fit for your shop?
What do you replace them with?

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00:18:38,920 --> 00:18:40,590
What's this?

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Meyerbeer! Dear God,
we used to admire this man.

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And so you should. Meyerbeer is a master,
he sells copy on copy.

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That's because you are not his publisher.
You're an incompetent idiot.

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Am I though? Am I?

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What are you, then?

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This, returned from
the Munich court theatre.

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This is monstrous! They have not
even broken the seal to read it.

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Exactly.

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You ain't being given, Herr Wagner,
that you ain't.

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But Meyerbeer is, which is a fact,

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hence he can go out
where he might be bought. Rienzi?

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Outside Dresden, where?

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Performed once only in Berlin.

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- Yes, and?
- And?

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Königsberg!

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Where?

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It is successful every time it is given here
in Dresden, so is Tannhäuser,

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so too will be Lohengrin.

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Damn you, Meser, I'm of a mind
to withdraw Lohengrin from you.

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Then I would remind you that you are not
entirely drawing the town.

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I will not go forward with Lohengrin
until you give me some money.

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Then you will lose a revolutionary work, sir!

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And are we not all revolutionaries
in these times?

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No, we ain't, Herr Röckel. We are not.

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We ain't.

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You sport with known revolutionaries,

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you have ideas above your station

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as to unions for musicians

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and a total turning of the Dresden Opera
on its head,

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which you put forward in writing
above the noble head of your director

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direct to the King!

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Direct in writing!

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Which king you would have murdered
in his bed.

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This time we live in is no time
for grand opera, no time at all.

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And a word to the wise. Hear me.

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Herr Director Lüttichau has intimated to me
as he ain't going to do Lohengrin,

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for your arrogance and your scorn
of the established genius

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such as Meyerbeer's genius,

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all of which gives me no faith in you,
young man.

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Get rid of this anarchy and all,

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then perhaps there'll be time for an opera,

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or better still...

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00:21:09,280 --> 00:21:10,870
...an operetta.

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00:21:11,920 --> 00:21:14,300
There are going to be new theatres,
new music.

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00:21:14,400 --> 00:21:18,950
All who come between German folk and
art will be swept away in the revolution.

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- Will they, though?
- Barbarossa.

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I am considering Barbarossa
as a fit subject.

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Germany looks for another Barbarossa.

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00:21:25,560 --> 00:21:30,790
Barbarossa like Lohengrin is not a fit subject
for an opera, not at all.

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00:21:30,880 --> 00:21:33,180
It ain't light enough, no laughs in it.

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00:21:34,120 --> 00:21:37,350
And what is more, no person
will wish to hear it,

200
00:21:37,440 --> 00:21:41,310
in that it involves that which people
do not wish to hear.

201
00:21:54,960 --> 00:21:57,390
Shall you not do duty
with the Communal Guard?

202
00:21:57,480 --> 00:22:00,630
I shall not, I have resigned.

203
00:22:01,680 --> 00:22:03,030
Why?

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00:22:04,280 --> 00:22:07,190
I suffer from a double hernia.

205
00:22:11,400 --> 00:22:13,780
Should you not go to Doctor Pusinelli?

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00:22:13,880 --> 00:22:18,230
It was Anton Pusinelli who recommended
that I had a double hernia.

207
00:22:19,280 --> 00:22:21,110
Why?

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00:22:21,200 --> 00:22:25,030
So that I need not do duty
with the Communal Guard.

209
00:22:25,120 --> 00:22:26,670
Why?

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00:22:26,760 --> 00:22:31,670
Who can tell which side they're going
to fight on? For the revolution or against it.

211
00:22:31,760 --> 00:22:34,630
I don't understand. Forgive me, Richard.

212
00:22:34,720 --> 00:22:37,180
In Paris it's about the starving rising up.

213
00:22:38,280 --> 00:22:43,190
In Hungary it's about the oppressed
shrugging off Austrian domination,

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00:22:43,280 --> 00:22:46,900
but who in turn will be dominated
by the Russian tsar.

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00:22:47,000 --> 00:22:50,430
In Saxony, here in Dresden,
it is about being given a sop

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00:22:50,520 --> 00:22:52,750
in the form of an assembly in Frankfurt,

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00:22:52,840 --> 00:22:57,470
which purports to be an assembly
of all Germany, but isn't...

218
00:22:57,560 --> 00:22:59,630
Which should have power but hasn't any.

219
00:22:59,720 --> 00:23:03,590
We are still half in Austria
and half under Prussia.

220
00:23:03,680 --> 00:23:08,030
And it's about the Parliament
which our king now threatens to dissolve.

221
00:23:08,120 --> 00:23:09,870
There isn't a Germany yet.

222
00:23:09,960 --> 00:23:12,630
Until there is a Germany
or a German consciousness,

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00:23:12,720 --> 00:23:15,350
I'm not going to have an audience.

224
00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:21,390
Damn it, people like me,
people like Semper, Röckel, Pusinelli,

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00:23:21,480 --> 00:23:24,670
people with minds, free minds,
doctors, lawyers, musicians,

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00:23:24,760 --> 00:23:27,990
are always going to be subservient
to the likes of Lüttichau,

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00:23:28,080 --> 00:23:30,540
to the court, to a court theatre
run by someone

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00:23:30,640 --> 00:23:33,750
who was Keeper of Forests and Trees
to the King.

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00:23:34,920 --> 00:23:38,110
He and Frau Lüttichau
have always been very kind to us.

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00:23:38,200 --> 00:23:42,310
Kindness! I don't want kindness.
I want money and I want a theatre.

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00:23:42,400 --> 00:23:45,110
I have plays, ideas for plays,
well thought-out ideas.

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00:23:45,200 --> 00:23:46,950
What happens to them?

233
00:23:47,040 --> 00:23:50,150
My report on the state
of the royal orchestra, what about that?

234
00:23:50,240 --> 00:23:52,800
Three months to prepare!
Not even read by the King.

235
00:23:54,520 --> 00:23:58,140
My ideas for a national theatre of Germany,
what about that?

236
00:23:58,240 --> 00:24:02,070
- Not taken seriously.
- Well, if there isn't a Germany...

237
00:24:02,160 --> 00:24:04,030
Hmm?

238
00:24:04,120 --> 00:24:06,750
Liszt is going to give Tannhäuser
in Weimar.

239
00:24:06,840 --> 00:24:10,430
- Yes, Liszt.
- Your devoted friend.

240
00:24:10,520 --> 00:24:13,270
- He also knows how to...
- How to what?

241
00:24:13,360 --> 00:24:17,510
Tug his very beautiful forelock
to his royal masters?

242
00:24:17,600 --> 00:24:20,790
Whenever you tug any part of him,
he responds.

243
00:24:20,880 --> 00:24:25,350
- I know, the only one.
- Oh, please, Richard!

244
00:24:25,440 --> 00:24:29,950
Don't plead with me, Minerl.
This isn't a time for pleading.

245
00:24:30,040 --> 00:24:32,910
How can one talk
to these sabbath Christians?

246
00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:37,310
I'm a better Christian than them because
I understand what it is to be a pagan.

247
00:24:37,400 --> 00:24:43,430
Lüttichau, so pure he extricts, extracts
himself from stinking when he farts.

248
00:24:43,520 --> 00:24:48,790
Talk to him about an art that embraces
everything - music, poetry, drama!

249
00:24:50,400 --> 00:24:53,350
I know what it is I'm brooding on.

250
00:24:53,440 --> 00:24:58,350
You know, I have told you, a grand, heroic -

251
00:24:59,320 --> 00:25:02,860
yes, for lack of a better word - opera.

252
00:25:03,840 --> 00:25:05,150
Yes.

253
00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:08,150
Siegfried's Death, hmm?

254
00:25:08,600 --> 00:25:11,160
Fire, water, hmm?

255
00:25:12,320 --> 00:25:20,350
Destruction, and out of the cleansing,
a hero, a German hero.

256
00:25:30,400 --> 00:25:34,710
Christ, Barbarossa, Siegfried...
the same person.

257
00:25:34,800 --> 00:25:37,790
You know
that nobody will be able to stage it.

258
00:25:37,880 --> 00:25:39,430
Do I?

259
00:25:39,520 --> 00:25:43,870
You mock me for my seriousness, but if
one is not serious about work, what then?

260
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:46,550
There is a stage, it is going to happen.

261
00:25:46,640 --> 00:25:49,710
You would have me a journeyman,
like the King and Lüttichau,

262
00:25:49,800 --> 00:25:53,030
paid to toss off a pretty little tune,
an accompanying tremolo

263
00:25:53,120 --> 00:25:55,950
to whatever hack drama
they see fit to put on.

264
00:25:56,040 --> 00:25:59,550
A pluck of strings, rumble of drum
to signify that depth of feeling

265
00:25:59,640 --> 00:26:03,420
which the words have been too shallow
to express - that is my job!

266
00:26:03,520 --> 00:26:05,630
That is not true!

267
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:23,110
- You're afraid.
- Yes, I am.

268
00:26:25,520 --> 00:26:28,910
I was a journeyman once, did everything,
when I first knew you.

269
00:26:29,000 --> 00:26:31,460
Magdeburg, scenery, everything.

270
00:26:31,560 --> 00:26:34,990
You emptied the hall of everyone
but your most ardent creditors

271
00:26:35,080 --> 00:26:37,070
with your Battle of Vittoria.

272
00:26:37,160 --> 00:26:39,460
A triumph, of noise...

273
00:26:40,560 --> 00:26:44,150
Scored for bugle drum and firecracker.

274
00:26:45,400 --> 00:26:50,310
Such a battle has seldom
been more cruelly fought in any concert hall.

275
00:26:50,400 --> 00:26:53,940
You, Minna, you didn't even stay.

276
00:26:58,080 --> 00:27:00,950
I hate noise, bangs.

277
00:27:09,440 --> 00:27:11,230
Oh, God...

278
00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:15,300
It has begun.

279
00:27:15,600 --> 00:27:17,350
Come on. Up here! More.

280
00:27:17,520 --> 00:27:20,390
Up here. Yes, as much as you can.
Come on!

281
00:27:20,480 --> 00:27:24,070
Yes, very good. Come on,
we haven't got much time! Come on!

282
00:27:25,200 --> 00:27:27,150
More, more! Yes, that's the way.

283
00:27:27,240 --> 00:27:29,510
Yes, very good.

284
00:27:30,560 --> 00:27:34,390
Yes, come on, plenty over here!
Come on, as high as you can!

285
00:27:34,480 --> 00:27:36,630
Come on.

286
00:27:37,720 --> 00:27:40,230
Yes, very good!

287
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:48,430
Yes, that's good!
Come on, up here on the top!

288
00:27:49,640 --> 00:27:53,630
- Uncle, uncle, what is it?
- Uncle, is it fighting?

289
00:27:53,720 --> 00:27:56,630
It is. Ottilie, Clara,
you are present at the beginning,

290
00:27:56,720 --> 00:28:00,150
a revolution led by artists
and men of means against privilege,

291
00:28:00,240 --> 00:28:01,910
intellect against indulgence.

292
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:06,150
Get me some food together, Minna.
I'll be gone for some time, until it's all over.

293
00:28:06,240 --> 00:28:09,390
The revolution. The revolution at last!

294
00:28:21,000 --> 00:28:24,870
After all these years, years of struggle,

295
00:28:24,960 --> 00:28:31,060
at last, Kapellmeister to the King of Saxony,
respected and secure in the post.

296
00:28:32,400 --> 00:28:34,830
Open the door! Open the door!

297
00:28:35,920 --> 00:28:39,620
- Open the door!
- No, no, I shall not!

298
00:28:39,720 --> 00:28:42,950
I shall not, not at all, not at all!

299
00:28:43,040 --> 00:28:46,190
No. No, Richard.

300
00:28:46,280 --> 00:28:49,430
Open this door. Do you hear me?

301
00:28:50,520 --> 00:28:54,140
Oh, Richard, they've come for you.

302
00:28:56,360 --> 00:28:57,990
They've come for him.

303
00:28:58,080 --> 00:29:00,590
Richard, Richard, where's Richard?

304
00:29:01,560 --> 00:29:03,270
We've started it.

305
00:29:03,360 --> 00:29:05,990
The King dared to dissolve the Parliament.

306
00:29:06,080 --> 00:29:08,910
Minna, where's Richard?

307
00:29:09,000 --> 00:29:12,510
When Richard comes,
he's to go to the foundry.

308
00:29:14,640 --> 00:29:20,790
Dresden is one of the foremost theatres
in Germany.

309
00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:23,150
We are so lucky.

310
00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,150
Open this door, do you hear me?

311
00:29:26,240 --> 00:29:28,350
We have starved.

312
00:29:29,760 --> 00:29:35,190
When we first came to Dresden,
we knocked walnuts from the trees to eat.

313
00:29:38,960 --> 00:29:41,470
I was so ashamed.

314
00:29:41,560 --> 00:29:43,470
Open the door!

315
00:29:43,560 --> 00:29:46,310
You have borrowed money from everyone,

316
00:29:46,400 --> 00:29:51,390
even from members of your own orchestra
who have little enough themselves.

317
00:29:51,480 --> 00:29:56,470
You rant about their conditions, poverty,
ill health and then you borrow from them.

318
00:29:56,560 --> 00:29:59,020
Open the door!

319
00:30:02,040 --> 00:30:06,390
The only friends you have left
have nothing themselves.

320
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:12,110
Anybody will do.

321
00:30:14,400 --> 00:30:16,510
Anybody.

322
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:23,910
Richard?

323
00:30:39,200 --> 00:30:41,550
Bakunin. See here. Come, look.

324
00:30:41,640 --> 00:30:43,030
I see.

325
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:47,350
You are facing your King's soldiers
drawn up in ranks.

326
00:30:47,440 --> 00:30:50,590
- Your own soldiers against you!
- Semper, see that it holds.

327
00:30:50,680 --> 00:30:53,830
Bakunin, these, calling on the soldiers
not to fight us.

328
00:30:53,920 --> 00:30:56,550
Ludicrous! Amateurs!

329
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:01,550
Soldiers of Saxony, lay down your arms!

330
00:31:01,640 --> 00:31:06,230
Come with me, Semper, Bakunin,
we shall inform them of their real duty.

331
00:31:06,320 --> 00:31:08,270
Simpletons!

332
00:31:10,160 --> 00:31:13,470
Lay down your arms, fellow Saxons,
fellow Germans.

333
00:31:13,560 --> 00:31:18,630
Join us, the people of Dresden, bearing
arms to defend our liberties and yours,

334
00:31:18,720 --> 00:31:20,190
our liberties and yours.

335
00:31:20,280 --> 00:31:24,150
We are all in the same boat. We have
to defend ourselves against oppression.

336
00:31:24,240 --> 00:31:27,510
Whatever happens in this world,
let us all be true Germans.

337
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:31,270
If you ask me,
whole thing is doomed to failure.

338
00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:23,870
The working man must lead
in the social struggle to come.

339
00:32:28,800 --> 00:32:31,360
Free men, artists, all of us.

340
00:32:31,440 --> 00:32:34,980
Our struggle today must express
the will of free people everywhere,

341
00:32:35,080 --> 00:32:37,310
regardless of national boundaries.

342
00:32:40,480 --> 00:32:44,350
Our nationalism, our nationalist socialism,

343
00:32:44,440 --> 00:32:46,670
must be only an ornament, not a limitation.

344
00:32:48,240 --> 00:32:51,270
Our work will either be
to free the human spirit

345
00:32:51,360 --> 00:32:54,710
or else condemn it forever
to chains of economic bondage.

346
00:32:56,920 --> 00:32:59,430
Wagner! Wagner!

347
00:33:05,320 --> 00:33:08,590
Wagner.

348
00:33:08,680 --> 00:33:13,540
Someone must show us,
show us what to do, direct them.

349
00:33:13,640 --> 00:33:15,390
Me? Not me.

350
00:33:15,480 --> 00:33:18,870
Ask Bakunin,
he's the professional revolutionary.

351
00:33:18,960 --> 00:33:23,190
I'm just a musician. Semper, you build
excellent barricades. What do you suggest?

352
00:33:23,280 --> 00:33:25,510
- You?
- No, no, no.

353
00:33:25,600 --> 00:33:29,830
Bakunin may well decide to throw
in his lot with this amateur revolution,

354
00:33:29,920 --> 00:33:32,870
but I'm sure he'd say
that it was doomed to failure.

355
00:33:32,960 --> 00:33:37,590
"The wrong people are inspiring it. "
I mean, people like you and me.

356
00:33:38,480 --> 00:33:41,230
I think he's just using us
to fan up the flames.

357
00:33:41,320 --> 00:33:44,630
Why don't we climb somewhere
where we can see what's happening?

358
00:33:44,720 --> 00:33:48,230
- Ah, the Church of the Cross.
- Good, good, you go.

359
00:33:48,320 --> 00:33:50,620
I am an architect
who has no head for heights.

360
00:33:50,720 --> 00:33:53,910
- Up there, like Christ on a temple!
- Oh, yes, yes.

361
00:33:54,000 --> 00:33:57,620
When you write your Jesus Christ opera,
the tenor must sing nothing but -

362
00:33:57,720 --> 00:33:58,860


363
00:33:58,960 --> 00:34:00,100
And the soprano -

364
00:34:00,200 --> 00:34:01,670


365
00:34:01,760 --> 00:34:04,710
And the basso continuo - that's Bakunin -

366
00:34:05,640 --> 00:34:10,790
"Fire! Fire! It's the only way,
the only way is to destroy everything!"

367
00:34:10,880 --> 00:34:12,830
Rubbish.

368
00:34:12,920 --> 00:34:14,750
Yes, yes, perhaps you're right.

369
00:34:14,840 --> 00:34:16,310


370
00:34:16,400 --> 00:34:17,870


371
00:34:17,960 --> 00:34:19,870


372
00:34:19,960 --> 00:34:22,230

Hang him!

373
00:34:22,320 --> 00:34:24,190
Fire! Fire!

374
00:34:24,280 --> 00:34:26,190

Hang him!

375
00:34:26,280 --> 00:34:30,790
Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire! Fire!

376
00:34:30,880 --> 00:34:33,390
Fire! Fire! Fire!

377
00:34:43,200 --> 00:34:45,030
Destruction!

378
00:34:45,120 --> 00:34:48,590
Destroy and start again!

379
00:34:48,680 --> 00:34:50,630
You set fire to your opera house!

380
00:34:50,720 --> 00:34:53,390
Of course I didn't,
but I should have done years ago.

381
00:34:53,480 --> 00:34:55,670
Such places should be burned down.

382
00:34:55,760 --> 00:34:58,430
One can't do anything with such places,
Semper.

383
00:34:59,800 --> 00:35:02,790
The places are built
for Italians and the court,

384
00:35:02,880 --> 00:35:08,750
tiny houses for tiny music,
little mice squeaking in tune.

385
00:35:08,840 --> 00:35:11,070
This... this is theatre.

386
00:35:18,040 --> 00:35:22,270
This. Flames.
We need theatres that are this.

387
00:35:22,360 --> 00:35:27,990
Amphitheatres of fire, buildings
that might encompass this, contain this.

388
00:35:28,080 --> 00:35:30,590
This is theatre!

389
00:36:43,600 --> 00:36:49,910
I scribble notes, what I see for days,
in the hope it may be useful,

390
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:51,950
may help them aim their shots.

391
00:37:03,960 --> 00:37:06,990
The lark, up there, soars to a dizzy height.

392
00:37:07,080 --> 00:37:09,460
Larks and heroes.

393
00:37:09,560 --> 00:37:12,550
Oh, how long will this all go on?

394
00:37:12,640 --> 00:37:15,020
Weeks now.

395
00:37:15,120 --> 00:37:18,590
The bullet that can lay me out
has not been cast.

396
00:37:21,400 --> 00:37:23,990
Left, right, left!

397
00:37:34,280 --> 00:37:36,510
- Do you see them?
- What?

398
00:37:36,600 --> 00:37:40,140
The bloody Prussians,
thousands of them, pouring in.

399
00:38:56,040 --> 00:38:58,500
Herr Wagner. We have met.

400
00:38:58,600 --> 00:39:01,160
Go back to your Prussian master, sir.

401
00:39:01,240 --> 00:39:04,910
Take note I come at the request
of your king to restore peace and order.

402
00:39:05,000 --> 00:39:07,190
Ridden post to get here.

403
00:39:07,280 --> 00:39:11,430
You may go back to
your rum-tiddy-dumming, bandmaster.

404
00:39:11,520 --> 00:39:15,110
Damn me, had I a musket, I'd drum you, sir.

405
00:39:15,200 --> 00:39:19,230
Go back to your royal Prussian master.
See if he wants his boots given a polish!

406
00:39:19,320 --> 00:39:23,310
You thought highly enough of my king
when you were touting your songs in Berlin.

407
00:39:23,400 --> 00:39:27,710
Tell me if I disremember,
but didn't you offer to write him a march?

408
00:39:28,800 --> 00:39:31,100
I accept royal patronage no more.

409
00:39:31,200 --> 00:39:34,870
True patronage will come
from the people of a united Germany.

410
00:39:34,960 --> 00:39:36,630
Under Prussia, sir.

411
00:39:36,720 --> 00:39:39,150
Under no man, sir, unless we elect him.

412
00:39:42,440 --> 00:39:45,590
Because of my high regard for you
as the composer of Rienzi...

413
00:39:46,960 --> 00:39:50,190
I shall not cut you down where you stand.

414
00:39:50,280 --> 00:39:52,790
I don't fight musicians.

415
00:39:55,080 --> 00:39:56,630
Prepare yourselves.

416
00:40:07,640 --> 00:40:09,710
What did the Prussian say?

417
00:40:09,800 --> 00:40:12,070
He'd seen Rienzi, must have liked it.

418
00:41:19,880 --> 00:41:23,310
Wagner! Wagner! Wagner!

419
00:43:08,040 --> 00:43:11,660
'Lt was as well that Wagner
left Dresden when he did.

420
00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:15,190
'Another day or so and he would have been
clapped in prison.

421
00:43:15,280 --> 00:43:18,950
'Röckel was confined for over 13 years.

422
00:43:19,040 --> 00:43:22,510
'As it was, a warrant was quickly taken up
for Wagner's arrest

423
00:43:22,600 --> 00:43:26,590
'and return to the scene of his activities
on the barricades,

424
00:43:26,680 --> 00:43:29,140
'there to be brought to trial,

425
00:43:29,240 --> 00:43:31,230
'to face the music as it were,

426
00:43:31,320 --> 00:43:34,910
'to face the music no longer
as Royal Kapellmeister

427
00:43:35,000 --> 00:43:37,030
'with an orchestra at his bidding,

428
00:43:37,120 --> 00:43:42,350
'but as a proscribed criminal,
a fugitive from justice.

429
00:43:49,840 --> 00:43:53,190
'For two months, he stayed
out of the clutches of the authorities

430
00:43:53,280 --> 00:43:57,990
'until he was at last
forced to flee Germany entirely.

431
00:43:58,080 --> 00:43:59,910
'Entirely...

432
00:44:02,000 --> 00:44:04,790
'He crossed into Switzerland from Bavaria,

433
00:44:04,880 --> 00:44:09,190
'at Lindau on the Bodensee, in disguise.

434
00:44:09,280 --> 00:44:11,660
'False papers.

435
00:44:11,760 --> 00:44:13,470
'Alone.

436
00:44:28,760 --> 00:44:32,430
'But as he wrote to a friend,

437
00:44:32,520 --> 00:44:36,590
"'From these ruins
I shall find most whom I need,

438
00:44:36,680 --> 00:44:39,750
"'then I shall erect a theatre
on the banks of the Rhine

439
00:44:39,840 --> 00:44:45,670
"'and scatter invitations throughout Europe
to a great dramatic festival. "

440
00:44:46,880 --> 00:44:53,550
'He did say that.
Then, as a man on the run, as it were... '

441
00:44:53,640 --> 00:44:57,340
Are you Professor Widman
or Herr Itzenpliz?

442
00:44:57,440 --> 00:44:59,230
Widman.

443
00:45:19,600 --> 00:45:23,750
'He was not to return to Germany,
any part of it,

444
00:45:23,840 --> 00:45:28,030
'not Saxony, not Dresden, not Bavaria.

445
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:33,710
'No state would have him home
for over a decade.

446
00:45:33,800 --> 00:45:40,710
'He was not to build his theatre
and scatter invitations for 27 years. '

447
00:46:31,880 --> 00:46:33,790
We have lunched.

448
00:46:34,840 --> 00:46:37,110
Now they are removing my doors.

449
00:46:39,360 --> 00:46:41,790
For some reason best known to themselves.

450
00:46:41,880 --> 00:46:48,550
Erm, Herr Müller, why is it necessary
for Herr Wagner to remove my doors?

451
00:46:48,640 --> 00:46:53,910
Mr Wagner must have a stage
from which to read us his poem.

452
00:46:55,840 --> 00:46:57,270
Ah...

453
00:47:00,360 --> 00:47:07,750
I see. So, Herr Müller, I have provided
a stage for Richard Wagner.

454
00:47:09,080 --> 00:47:12,550
Sit down everybody, please.
Make yourselves comfortable.

455
00:47:18,120 --> 00:47:21,990
Before... before reading
my poem Siegfried to you,

456
00:47:22,080 --> 00:47:26,350
before doing this, I would like you
to try and understand my position.

457
00:47:26,440 --> 00:47:29,830
On a door. You are positioned on a door.

458
00:47:29,920 --> 00:47:33,070
Isn't he, Baumgartner,
on one of Jacob Sulzer's doors?

459
00:47:33,160 --> 00:47:35,070
Please, please, please!

460
00:47:35,160 --> 00:47:36,950
My position as an artist,

461
00:47:37,040 --> 00:47:40,580
my reasons for being a year in exile
without writing one note of music,

462
00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:44,460
my... my purpose, my quest,

463
00:47:44,560 --> 00:47:50,110
my search for and study of those myths
and legends of our German past.

464
00:47:51,160 --> 00:47:56,180
The German artist of the future will emerge
from his mythic past as I am emerging.

465
00:47:56,280 --> 00:48:01,470
I am shedding those distractions which
wasted me, those boltholes into oblivion.

466
00:48:01,560 --> 00:48:05,510
Security, success, fear of failure.

467
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:08,550
Change.

468
00:48:08,640 --> 00:48:12,340
I seek to change entirely
that which has led to me being here,

469
00:48:12,440 --> 00:48:15,980
searched for as a posted criminal
in my own country...

470
00:48:17,640 --> 00:48:21,110
where we failed to change anything.

471
00:48:27,000 --> 00:48:30,910
Out of the realm of the womb
of night and death,

472
00:48:31,000 --> 00:48:34,620
there came into being a race
dwelling in Nibelheim,

473
00:48:34,720 --> 00:48:38,670
that is in gloomy subterranean clefts
and caverns.

474
00:48:38,760 --> 00:48:41,350
They are known as the Nibelungs.

475
00:48:41,440 --> 00:48:47,830
Feverishly they burrow through the bowels
of the earth like worms in a dead body.

476
00:48:47,920 --> 00:48:54,470
They anneal and smelt
and smith hard metals.

477
00:49:01,320 --> 00:49:06,070
'Wagner began the years of his exile
in Zurich,

478
00:49:06,160 --> 00:49:09,390
'a town devoid of art in the public sense.

479
00:49:09,480 --> 00:49:11,990
'But it did have a thriving music society.

480
00:49:12,080 --> 00:49:17,230
'Good, simple-hearted cultured persons,
determined to be friendly,

481
00:49:17,320 --> 00:49:21,020
'put him in the way of a few coins
to pay the rent.

482
00:49:21,120 --> 00:49:24,390
'Minna had resisted joining him
for some time.

483
00:49:24,480 --> 00:49:26,550
'She had been happy in Dresden.

484
00:49:27,640 --> 00:49:31,180
'Lt had been all she wanted
until the barricades went up,

485
00:49:31,280 --> 00:49:36,070
'and she was fearful that as soon as
she left Dresden she would be shut out,

486
00:49:36,160 --> 00:49:40,230
'borders closed against her
as they were against her husband.

487
00:49:40,320 --> 00:49:45,030
'She could not face the thought
of a life of exile outside Germany.

488
00:49:46,080 --> 00:49:50,470
'But she allowed herself to be assured
by those of us who knew such things

489
00:49:50,560 --> 00:49:54,510
'that there would be no question
of her being forbidden Dresden.

490
00:49:54,600 --> 00:49:57,630
'She had no charge against her
of any action treasonable.

491
00:49:57,720 --> 00:50:00,470
'She could therefore come and go
as she pleased.

492
00:50:00,560 --> 00:50:04,070
'So, blameless, she went

493
00:50:04,160 --> 00:50:10,790
'to be at her husband's side in his exile
in a foreign land, his pleadings answered.

494
00:50:10,880 --> 00:50:12,630
"'Very well," she thought.

495
00:50:12,720 --> 00:50:17,840
'Lf she was sure she could come back
to her beloved Germany, she would go,

496
00:50:17,920 --> 00:50:21,030
'make a home for her beloved Richel

497
00:50:21,120 --> 00:50:25,310
'with Natalie, her daughter
by a previous never-mentioned liaison,

498
00:50:25,400 --> 00:50:32,150
'their dog Peps, her parrot Papo,
and sundry items of furniture and comfort. '

499
00:50:33,720 --> 00:50:35,790
Siegfried's Death.

500
00:50:36,640 --> 00:50:37,670
First Norn.

501
00:50:38,960 --> 00:50:43,390
- First what?
- Norn, you fool!

502
00:50:43,480 --> 00:50:44,540
Norn...

503
00:50:44,640 --> 00:50:48,590
First Norn: In the East I wove!

504
00:50:48,680 --> 00:50:51,950
Second Norn: In the West I wound!

505
00:50:52,040 --> 00:50:55,430
Third Norn: To the North I cast!

506
00:50:55,520 --> 00:50:57,390
What wound'st thou in the West?

507
00:50:57,480 --> 00:51:00,990
Second Norn: What wov'st thou in the East?

508
00:51:01,080 --> 00:51:04,310
First Norn: Alberich robbed the Rheingold,

509
00:51:04,400 --> 00:51:08,270
bent there from a ring,
bound there by his brethren.

510
00:51:08,360 --> 00:51:15,150
Second Norn: Thralls the Nibelungen,
thrall to Alberich since his ring was stolen.

511
00:51:15,240 --> 00:51:19,630
Third Norn: Free the elves of darkness.
Free too Alberich.

512
00:51:19,720 --> 00:51:21,510
Rheingold, rest in the waters.

513
00:51:21,600 --> 00:51:24,160
First Norn: In the East I wove!

514
00:51:24,240 --> 00:51:26,800
Second Norn: In the West I wound!

515
00:51:26,880 --> 00:51:30,500
Third Norn: To the North I cast!
What would'st thou in the West?

516
00:51:30,600 --> 00:51:32,790
Second Norn: What wov'st thou in the East?

517
00:51:32,880 --> 00:51:37,390
First Norn: The giants built the Godsberg.
With threats they asked the ring in pay.

518
00:51:37,480 --> 00:51:40,510
The Gods bereft it from the Nibelung.

519
00:51:47,520 --> 00:51:50,870
'When she got there, in September 1849,

520
00:51:50,960 --> 00:51:55,710
'she rolled up her sleeves
and set to... set to. '

521
00:51:56,800 --> 00:52:02,030
That on night hide once I'd fought
when the fearsome worm I slew.

522
00:52:02,120 --> 00:52:06,550
Hagen: Brünnhilde, woman bold,
knowst thou a right the ring.

523
00:52:06,640 --> 00:52:08,710
Wast it to Günther thou gav'st?

524
00:52:08,800 --> 00:52:10,350
Then is it his?

525
00:52:10,440 --> 00:52:15,270
And Siegfried hath won it by trick,
which the treacherous years shall atone.

526
00:52:15,360 --> 00:52:19,350
Brünnhilde: Betrayed,
betrayed most shamefully betrayed.

527
00:52:19,440 --> 00:52:23,910
Treason, treason as never yet was venged.

528
00:52:24,000 --> 00:52:27,950
Gudrun, the Clansmen and Women:
Treason!

529
00:52:28,040 --> 00:52:29,750
Vengeance!

530
00:52:29,840 --> 00:52:32,510
On whom?

531
00:52:40,320 --> 00:52:42,190
Ah, Liszt...

532
00:52:48,600 --> 00:52:50,550
The Fairies.

533
00:52:54,600 --> 00:52:56,950
37 years of age!

534
00:52:58,920 --> 00:53:01,950
"Kapellmeister Richard Wagner
is wanted for examination

535
00:53:02,040 --> 00:53:06,430
"on account of his active participation
in the recent uprising.

536
00:53:07,920 --> 00:53:12,780
"Medium height, brown hair,
wears spectacles. "

537
00:53:12,880 --> 00:53:14,830
That could be anyone.

538
00:53:14,920 --> 00:53:16,710
Thank God.

539
00:53:19,040 --> 00:53:22,820
Wotan! Wotan! Ruler of Gods!

540
00:53:22,920 --> 00:53:25,350
Wotan, bless thou the flames.

541
00:53:25,440 --> 00:53:27,070
Burn hero and bride,

542
00:53:27,160 --> 00:53:29,430
burn eke the true horse.

543
00:53:29,520 --> 00:53:34,640
In joy may greet Valhall,
made one for a bliss without end.

544
00:53:34,720 --> 00:53:37,750
My venger, Hagen, my son.

545
00:53:37,840 --> 00:53:41,590
Rescue, rescue the Ring.

546
00:53:42,680 --> 00:53:45,110
The end.

547
00:53:45,200 --> 00:53:48,150
Herr Wagner, let me fill your glass.

548
00:53:48,240 --> 00:53:52,470
You have of course read Wolfram
von Eschenbach, the Northern Sagas?

549
00:53:52,560 --> 00:53:54,350
Yes, yes.

550
00:53:54,440 --> 00:54:00,350
Opera bores me, bores me,
it's got nothing to say.

551
00:54:00,440 --> 00:54:03,870
I don't write operas. I write music drama.

552
00:54:03,960 --> 00:54:07,580
Ah, that's it, that's the thing.

553
00:54:07,680 --> 00:54:13,830
That doesn't bore me at all. Are any
of your musicals being given anywhere?

554
00:54:13,920 --> 00:54:16,670
Ah, yes, musicals...

555
00:54:18,040 --> 00:54:20,830
Liszt is giving Tannhäuser in Weimar.

556
00:54:20,920 --> 00:54:23,550
- I can't go there!
- Neither can I any more.

557
00:54:23,640 --> 00:54:30,310
Switzerland is full of people trying to flee
from somewhere, Paris, Vienna...

558
00:54:30,400 --> 00:54:34,550
- Dresden.
- Ah, yes, Dresden.

559
00:54:34,640 --> 00:54:37,950
He'll be arrested should he show his face
anywhere in Germany.

560
00:54:38,040 --> 00:54:39,990
Paris.

561
00:54:40,080 --> 00:54:43,510
Take this Siegfried fellow to Paris.

562
00:54:43,600 --> 00:54:48,790
- But you'll have to put songs in it for Paris.
- Ah, yes, songs...

563
00:56:32,240 --> 00:56:36,630
To meet you at last, Frau Wagner.
Tell me, was the concert not?

564
00:56:36,720 --> 00:56:38,150
No, it was not.

565
00:56:38,240 --> 00:56:43,150
I know most of the orchestra are amateur
musicians, but does the music not?

566
00:56:43,240 --> 00:56:45,470
- It does not.
- Oh!

567
00:56:45,560 --> 00:56:48,710
Dresden has one of the finest orchestras
in Germany.

568
00:56:48,800 --> 00:56:50,990
- This is a band.
- Oh!

569
00:56:51,080 --> 00:56:52,870
A small-town band.

570
00:56:52,960 --> 00:56:55,790
- A Swiss cheese and mountain call band.
- Oh!

571
00:57:02,560 --> 00:57:04,110
You were all dreadful!

572
00:57:04,200 --> 00:57:10,270
I think that Richard's greatness
lies in the way that he faces adversity.

573
00:57:12,280 --> 00:57:14,230
- Do you?
- Oh!

574
00:57:14,320 --> 00:57:16,830
My dear Sulzer, come in, come in.

575
00:57:17,600 --> 00:57:23,110
I hear that your friend Meyerbeer
has had another big success in Paris.

576
00:57:23,200 --> 00:57:27,390
My dear Sulzer, you would not have me
pander to a swindler such as he?

577
00:57:27,480 --> 00:57:29,350
Meyerbeer.

578
00:57:29,440 --> 00:57:33,550
Last time I encountered Meyerbeer was
in Paris in the music shop of Schlesinger.

579
00:57:33,640 --> 00:57:35,390
Was, at one time, Schlesinger's,

580
00:57:35,480 --> 00:57:40,070
now owned by a much more pronounced
type of Hebrew, one Brandus.

581
00:57:40,160 --> 00:57:43,430
While I made conversation
with dear old Monsieur Henri,

582
00:57:43,520 --> 00:57:46,150
the only person left
at all friendly and welcoming,

583
00:57:46,240 --> 00:57:48,270
do you know, Meyerbeer hid from me?

584
00:57:48,360 --> 00:57:51,310
But I winkled him out,
brought him to face me there.

585
00:57:51,400 --> 00:57:55,100
Meyerbeer, master of melodious moonshine
forced to come out of his lair,

586
00:57:55,200 --> 00:57:58,110
stuttering, stammering,
professing false goodwill,

587
00:57:58,200 --> 00:58:00,830
and here it came, here it came.

588
00:58:00,920 --> 00:58:05,270
His assumption that I was in Paris
to seek, as it were, my fortune!

589
00:58:06,480 --> 00:58:09,750
Meyerbeer was always willing
to help and did so often,

590
00:58:09,840 --> 00:58:12,710
but like everyone else who helps Richard,

591
00:58:12,800 --> 00:58:16,150
they are eventually repaid
with scorn and derision.

592
00:58:16,240 --> 00:58:17,380
Oh!

593
00:58:17,480 --> 00:58:20,350
Meyerbeer gave out
a belch of manuscript dust,

594
00:58:20,440 --> 00:58:22,630
his assumption dispelled by assuring him

595
00:58:22,720 --> 00:58:26,990
that the thought of having anything done,
or underdone, or overdone in Paris

596
00:58:27,080 --> 00:58:28,790
was odious to me.

597
00:58:28,880 --> 00:58:32,870
"But," whines Meyerbeer, "Liszt has
published a brilliant article about you.

598
00:58:32,960 --> 00:58:34,230
"We all read it. "

599
00:58:34,320 --> 00:58:37,030
"Ah," replied I,
"it had not really occurred to me

600
00:58:37,120 --> 00:58:41,390
"that the enthusiastic devotion of a friend
should be regarded as speculation. "

601
00:58:41,480 --> 00:58:46,910
"But," quoth he, and here the man lies bare,
the 30 pieces of silver chink,

602
00:58:47,000 --> 00:58:49,910
"but the article created a sensation in Paris,

603
00:58:50,000 --> 00:58:53,670
"you must make profit out of it
by following it up with something. "

604
00:58:53,760 --> 00:58:55,790
Profit?

605
00:58:55,880 --> 00:58:59,230
I told him that there were
greater occupations for my mind

606
00:58:59,320 --> 00:59:03,310
when the whole world seemed
to be in turmoil and reaction.

607
00:59:03,400 --> 00:59:08,340
"But", a great but-erer is Meyerbeer,
"but what do you expect to get out of it?

608
00:59:08,440 --> 00:59:11,430
"Are you set to write scores
for the barricades?"

609
00:59:11,520 --> 00:59:15,300
Whereupon I told him it was not in my mind
to write any scores at all,

610
00:59:15,400 --> 00:59:18,790
which took the ground straight
from under him and laid him on it.

611
00:59:18,880 --> 00:59:21,150
Meyerbeer! The Meyerbeer clique!

612
00:59:21,240 --> 00:59:24,030
Twittering Nibelungs,
maggots deep in the flesh,

613
00:59:24,120 --> 00:59:27,590
feeding on the sweet,
pretty, fleshy confection that is Paris,

614
00:59:27,680 --> 00:59:30,390
a blood cake iced
and spattered with silver and gold.

615
00:59:30,480 --> 00:59:32,630
Pretty tunes, music for brothels.

616
00:59:32,720 --> 00:59:36,830
Deep inside the cake, they twitter
and wriggle and copulate and kiss and suck,

617
00:59:36,920 --> 00:59:38,590
growing bellies that are fat,

618
00:59:38,680 --> 00:59:42,220
shoulders broad enough to carry
the ponderous crucifixion of fame.

619
00:59:42,320 --> 00:59:44,390
Victors of the fame game.

620
00:59:44,480 --> 00:59:49,420
I, Meyerbeer, salute you with five acts
and a ballet decollete called an opera!

621
00:59:49,520 --> 00:59:52,870
Bravo, an opera by Meyerbeer!

622
00:59:52,960 --> 00:59:55,790
The world hangs hushed
on every nauseous note,

623
00:59:55,880 --> 00:59:58,870
stands transfixed in awe at titles
promising seriousness.

624
00:59:58,960 --> 01:00:03,430
Hollow titles, rattling with arias
and melodramatic arpeggios.

625
01:00:03,520 --> 01:00:08,790
Empty rodomontade titles like The Prophet,
a prophet who tells one nothing.

626
01:00:08,880 --> 01:00:14,670
Meyerbeer entitles his grand opera
The Prophet and it prophesies nothing.

627
01:00:36,560 --> 01:00:38,550
I can no more write operas

628
01:00:38,640 --> 01:00:42,870
than I can fly to Paris
without the aid of wires from a gridiron.

629
01:00:50,320 --> 01:00:54,630
I know you have come to encourage me.
I know.

630
01:00:54,720 --> 01:00:57,550
I know you mean well. I know.

631
01:00:59,040 --> 01:01:05,470
I swing. I am suspended, Minna.
I am neither here nor there.

632
01:01:05,560 --> 01:01:07,470
I wait for times to change

633
01:01:07,560 --> 01:01:12,420
and try to change times
by the essays I write which you dismiss...

634
01:01:12,520 --> 01:01:14,510
...thus.

635
01:01:17,360 --> 01:01:20,950
There is a Mrs Ritter who has a son

636
01:01:21,040 --> 01:01:24,070
she wishes to be a musician.

637
01:01:24,160 --> 01:01:27,470
A composer, I fear, of operas.

638
01:01:28,320 --> 01:01:33,510
She and another lady
have offered to finance me while...

639
01:01:35,120 --> 01:01:37,420
Oh, Minna...

640
01:01:40,680 --> 01:01:44,110
- How we've missed you.
- Yes.

641
01:01:44,840 --> 01:01:47,950
'Mademoiselle Minna Planer.

642
01:01:48,040 --> 01:01:53,710
'The beautiful, unattainable actress I paid
court to for two years and two months

643
01:01:53,800 --> 01:01:56,070
'before she would have me. '

644
01:01:57,120 --> 01:01:59,870
You must not have another child.

645
01:02:00,480 --> 01:02:02,710
No.

646
01:02:02,800 --> 01:02:04,750
I must never...

647
01:02:07,240 --> 01:02:09,800
I must remind you, Richard,

648
01:02:11,000 --> 01:02:15,630
that if I am barren,
as I am barren,

649
01:02:15,720 --> 01:02:20,030
it is because your child died
before it could be born

650
01:02:20,120 --> 01:02:24,590
while we fled from your creditors,
pursued by Cossacks.

651
01:02:24,680 --> 01:02:26,870
Maybe.

652
01:02:28,320 --> 01:02:31,790
To have another child
would mean my death.

653
01:02:33,040 --> 01:02:35,150
Yes...

654
01:02:37,200 --> 01:02:39,230
Never to have had sufficient money.

655
01:02:40,880 --> 01:02:42,590
Never.

656
01:02:43,760 --> 01:02:48,470
It is so... graceless.

657
01:02:48,560 --> 01:02:50,670
What would you have me do?

658
01:02:52,560 --> 01:02:54,230
Work as others work.

659
01:02:54,320 --> 01:03:00,190
Well, I give concerts.
I concertise for pitiful sums of money.

660
01:03:04,600 --> 01:03:07,670
Is there something to eat?

661
01:03:07,760 --> 01:03:10,790
Tomorrow there will be, thank God.

662
01:03:11,480 --> 01:03:14,910
- And Liszt?
- I thank Liszt.

663
01:03:16,320 --> 01:03:19,750
Oh, I am your child, Minna.

664
01:03:20,440 --> 01:03:22,590
I sometimes think so.

665
01:03:24,360 --> 01:03:29,710
Richard? Why must you take money
from this woman?

666
01:03:31,320 --> 01:03:35,590
Mrs Ritter? Because she offers it
and she has it. She's English, I think.

667
01:03:35,680 --> 01:03:39,300
- Or it's the other one. One of them is.
- Is it beneath your dignity

668
01:03:39,400 --> 01:03:42,430
to earn money rather than borrow it?

669
01:03:42,520 --> 01:03:47,270
These pamphlets and essays
you write. They waste your time.

670
01:03:48,120 --> 01:03:51,740
You're a conductor of concerts.
Conduct them.

671
01:03:51,840 --> 01:03:55,190
You're a writer of music. Write it.

672
01:03:55,280 --> 01:03:58,790
- So that we can live.
- Mmm...

673
01:03:58,880 --> 01:04:02,390
Liszt wants me to go to Paris.
He thinks I should.

674
01:04:03,000 --> 01:04:06,870
I'm grateful to Liszt,
but he needs me more than I need him.

675
01:04:06,960 --> 01:04:10,830
He is, after all, a performer, hmm?

676
01:04:12,160 --> 01:04:14,350
The darling of the salons.

677
01:04:14,440 --> 01:04:18,950
They watch his hands on the piano
and imagine them up their skirts.

678
01:04:19,040 --> 01:04:20,910
Richard!

679
01:04:26,160 --> 01:04:29,230
But he sees the music of the future.

680
01:04:30,200 --> 01:04:32,230
He sees it.

681
01:04:32,320 --> 01:04:38,150
He sees the fusion of music and drama,
dimly, as I see it. Very dimly.

682
01:04:38,240 --> 01:04:42,070
Which is why I can't write anything
that will please you.

683
01:04:43,800 --> 01:04:46,630
The form eludes me.

684
01:04:47,640 --> 01:04:49,390
I know it.

685
01:04:50,520 --> 01:04:54,300
Greek, vast amphitheatres.

686
01:04:55,600 --> 01:04:58,710
Life and worship in their art.

687
01:04:58,800 --> 01:05:02,340
Sensual performances
understood by everyone.

688
01:05:02,440 --> 01:05:05,980
Slaves, masters, all equal in intellect.

689
01:05:06,080 --> 01:05:11,350
Equal in sensitivity.
Same tongue, same myths.

690
01:05:11,440 --> 01:05:14,980
Instantly accessible through shared desires.

691
01:05:15,080 --> 01:05:18,270
Experience. Food, even.

692
01:05:18,360 --> 01:05:21,980
The same simple attic food.

693
01:05:22,080 --> 01:05:24,910
Milk, wine, olives.

694
01:05:25,000 --> 01:05:31,340
The same women, enjoyed by master
and slave alike in the same open manner.

695
01:05:32,680 --> 01:05:35,670
Music is feminine.

696
01:05:36,680 --> 01:05:42,310
It lies waiting to be fertilised,
the dramatic seed thrust into it.

697
01:05:43,160 --> 01:05:47,630
Words, taken up
and carried further by the music.

698
01:05:48,560 --> 01:05:50,590
But poetry...

699
01:05:54,920 --> 01:05:58,870
Poetry is the reason for music.

700
01:05:58,960 --> 01:06:03,190
And drama is the reason for both.

701
01:06:31,520 --> 01:06:33,190
Paris?

702
01:06:34,840 --> 01:06:38,270
Paris is for Meyerbeer
and his vapid nonsense

703
01:06:38,360 --> 01:06:45,230
for which he earned in royalties for
one opera some 750,000 marks last year.

704
01:06:45,320 --> 01:06:49,910
Whereas I got 900 marks
for the entire rights of Rienzi.

705
01:06:51,280 --> 01:06:55,230
I told everyone you were commissioned
to write something for Paris.

706
01:06:55,320 --> 01:06:58,910
- It was announced in the Dresden papers.
- Why?

707
01:07:00,240 --> 01:07:02,620
So I should not be ashamed of you.

708
01:07:03,640 --> 01:07:05,670
Ah, yes. Yes...

709
01:07:06,840 --> 01:07:11,310
Meyerbeer is in Paris
and is afraid of being buried alive,

710
01:07:11,400 --> 01:07:16,190
given instructions that bells
should be tied to his toes when he goes.

711
01:07:17,000 --> 01:07:20,070
He fears suffocation after death.

712
01:07:20,160 --> 01:07:22,830
I am in terror of it happening now.

713
01:07:24,240 --> 01:07:26,230
While I live.

714
01:07:27,640 --> 01:07:29,590
Heavens.

715
01:07:30,360 --> 01:07:34,550
I have seen a theatre of flames.

716
01:07:43,440 --> 01:07:46,870
- Liszt does Lohengrin?
- Yes, something.

717
01:07:46,960 --> 01:07:49,750
Lohengrin,
the King of the Fairies.

718
01:07:49,840 --> 01:07:54,510
You remember.
Lohengrin, the swan knight. A fairy.

719
01:07:54,600 --> 01:07:56,510
Mmm?

720
01:07:57,800 --> 01:08:02,110
Silk? How on earth
have you managed to afford silk?

721
01:08:02,200 --> 01:08:05,740
- What?
- You've sent me no money for weeks.

722
01:08:05,840 --> 01:08:09,070
- I always try, Minna.
- Yes, you do.

723
01:08:10,040 --> 01:08:12,830
- But silk.
- It isn't paid for.

724
01:08:14,240 --> 01:08:17,270
Minna, you know
I can't wear anything but silk.

725
01:08:17,360 --> 01:08:19,990
Oh, Richard...

726
01:08:21,280 --> 01:08:26,830
Mitzel... Liszt suggested the court
at Weimar might pay me a yearly sum.

727
01:08:26,920 --> 01:08:32,040
A nice house might be found for you.
Lohengrin might be given in English.

728
01:08:32,120 --> 01:08:34,870
London might do it.

729
01:08:35,920 --> 01:08:40,150
You were right, Mitzel, my old love,
my dear old love.

730
01:08:41,120 --> 01:08:45,590
Minna, the beautiful actress
laid low by the madman Wagner.

731
01:08:45,680 --> 01:08:48,670
I must get something for Paris.

732
01:08:49,640 --> 01:08:52,200
What do you say to Wieland the Smith?

733
01:08:52,280 --> 01:08:54,910
Shall your old Richel do that?

734
01:08:55,000 --> 01:09:00,310
I know you think I should settle to
a decent living, not live off other people.

735
01:09:01,280 --> 01:09:04,980
I've been offered a few francs a year
to write something

736
01:09:05,080 --> 01:09:08,150
by a lady from Edinburgh
who lives in Bordeaux.

737
01:09:08,240 --> 01:09:12,510
She and Frau Ritter met her daughter
in Dresden.

738
01:09:12,600 --> 01:09:16,030
Jessie Taylor, called Laussot now

739
01:09:16,120 --> 01:09:19,350
married a young wine merchant.
He was on his beam ends.

740
01:09:20,200 --> 01:09:24,950
If her mother can put money into wine,
why not into Wieland the Smith, what?

741
01:09:25,040 --> 01:09:27,340
Where is there a blacksmith? Where?

742
01:09:27,440 --> 01:09:30,510
I need to hear the sound of metal
being struck.

743
01:09:30,600 --> 01:09:33,470
I must learn to forge metal.

744
01:09:33,560 --> 01:09:35,550
And I must learn to walk.

745
01:09:41,760 --> 01:09:44,220
Richard, your words, your ideas

746
01:09:44,320 --> 01:09:46,270
fill me with...

747
01:09:46,360 --> 01:09:48,430
confusion, love.

748
01:10:01,680 --> 01:10:04,430
- Yes, love.
- I give it you...

749
01:10:04,520 --> 01:10:06,470
freely.

750
01:10:13,880 --> 01:10:14,830
Jesse, I know.

751
01:10:16,640 --> 01:10:21,070
Wieland the Smith.
You are his bride - chained,

752
01:10:21,160 --> 01:10:24,750
iron-chained
and waiting for him to strike off the chains.

753
01:10:26,080 --> 01:10:28,030
I do feel that.

754
01:11:09,920 --> 01:11:11,870
Enter.

755
01:11:21,440 --> 01:11:25,910
Did you enjoy your walk, Mr Wagner?

756
01:11:26,000 --> 01:11:28,830
The sea near Bordeaux is very bracing.

757
01:11:28,920 --> 01:11:34,910
I find it not within me to enjoy
anything at the moment. I fear for my health.

758
01:11:35,000 --> 01:11:38,030
Oh, how distressing.

759
01:11:40,440 --> 01:11:42,390
Did Jesse tire you?

760
01:11:45,960 --> 01:11:47,910
No, no, she...

761
01:11:48,000 --> 01:11:49,670
She...

762
01:11:49,760 --> 01:11:53,350
- She was an inspiration.
- I'm so pleased.

763
01:12:03,480 --> 01:12:05,750
Is the sea air of Bordeaux

764
01:12:05,840 --> 01:12:09,750
helping you to recover
from that which has brought you so low?

765
01:12:10,840 --> 01:12:12,790
Thanks also to you...

766
01:12:12,880 --> 01:12:15,670
sire, and to your beautiful young wife

767
01:12:15,760 --> 01:12:19,950
and to Mrs Taylor and, of course,
we must never forget Frau Ritter

768
01:12:20,040 --> 01:12:21,590
who brought us all together.

769
01:12:21,680 --> 01:12:24,830
She is a good friend, a discerning woman.

770
01:12:24,920 --> 01:12:28,830
I see that your Dresden friends
have been sentenced to death

771
01:12:28,920 --> 01:12:30,950
for their part in the uprising.

772
01:12:32,040 --> 01:12:33,990
- Yes.
- Unthinkable.

773
01:12:35,080 --> 01:12:36,750
I must...

774
01:12:36,840 --> 01:12:38,430
Er, you must go to her.

775
01:12:38,520 --> 01:12:40,470
Yes.

776
01:12:51,880 --> 01:12:53,830
I was overcome.

777
01:12:53,920 --> 01:12:56,750
You are not now, overcome?

778
01:13:00,280 --> 01:13:02,230
I am recovered.

779
01:13:03,000 --> 01:13:04,470
Yes, well.

780
01:13:04,560 --> 01:13:06,510
Well...

781
01:13:07,320 --> 01:13:09,270
we are all upset

782
01:13:09,360 --> 01:13:12,270
at the thought
of what might be lost to the world

783
01:13:12,360 --> 01:13:17,830
should Mr Wagner have been took up by
the Dresden authorities and so dealt with.

784
01:13:18,920 --> 01:13:24,040
Yes, it is well known that my part
in the events was that of a mere spectator.

785
01:13:24,120 --> 01:13:26,230
An innocent

786
01:13:26,320 --> 01:13:28,270
laid bare.

787
01:13:28,360 --> 01:13:30,310
A bystander.

788
01:13:30,400 --> 01:13:32,750
They were, are...

789
01:13:32,840 --> 01:13:35,630
for a few days more, my friends.

790
01:13:36,720 --> 01:13:38,670
Where will they go?

791
01:13:38,760 --> 01:13:40,710
What will they find?

792
01:13:41,800 --> 01:13:44,830
Is there a heavenly place for them, a shrine?

793
01:13:45,920 --> 01:13:47,950
A mossy bank?

794
01:13:48,040 --> 01:13:50,310
I've tried to...

795
01:13:50,400 --> 01:13:53,190
explain my feelings, have written to them

796
01:13:54,240 --> 01:13:57,750
in simple hope that they will allow me
into their last...

797
01:13:59,840 --> 01:14:06,020
I have told them that I am protected
by the most blessed friendship and love.

798
01:14:06,120 --> 01:14:08,070
Am I not in the bosom,

799
01:14:08,160 --> 01:14:11,830
the bosom, that place where love lurks

800
01:14:11,920 --> 01:14:14,070
waits to do its healing?

801
01:14:15,160 --> 01:14:17,950
I tell them nothing of the financial plight
I am in.

802
01:14:19,040 --> 01:14:20,710
I tell them that, however

803
01:14:20,800 --> 01:14:22,750
with renewed hope

804
01:14:22,840 --> 01:14:24,790
and fresh strength to my...

805
01:14:25,880 --> 01:14:27,910
my...

806
01:14:28,000 --> 01:14:29,950
in my wings

807
01:14:30,040 --> 01:14:33,030
I am carrying on,
going where they would wish

808
01:14:33,120 --> 01:14:36,550
in my own way
and according to my own powers

809
01:14:36,640 --> 01:14:38,590
refleshed

810
01:14:38,680 --> 01:14:41,390
the work for which they, supple-limbed

811
01:14:41,480 --> 01:14:45,390
heroes, are laying down their lives.

812
01:14:45,480 --> 01:14:50,830
- They are?
- Is there no hope... of reconciliation

813
01:14:55,840 --> 01:14:58,990
between yourself and the authorities,
Mr Wagner?

814
01:14:59,840 --> 01:15:03,620
Shall you never be reinstated
in your position in Dresden?

815
01:15:03,720 --> 01:15:06,350
That, madam, I do not desire

816
01:15:07,520 --> 01:15:11,590
and with your money, which you've
so generously offered to remit me

817
01:15:11,680 --> 01:15:15,380
it is not necessary for me
to be a servant ever again.

818
01:15:17,800 --> 01:15:20,030
I shall go to the east.

819
01:15:21,800 --> 01:15:24,030
What an excellent idea.

820
01:15:24,120 --> 01:15:26,190
East of where?

821
01:15:26,280 --> 01:15:28,230
Mrs Taylor...

822
01:15:28,320 --> 01:15:31,110
with the 3,000 francs a year,

823
01:15:31,200 --> 01:15:33,110
I will use it for...

824
01:15:35,560 --> 01:15:37,940
I will use half of it to provide for my wife.

825
01:15:38,040 --> 01:15:39,550
Oh.

826
01:15:43,520 --> 01:15:46,110
How far east did you have in mind?

827
01:16:05,760 --> 01:16:07,710
I... am going with him.

828
01:16:07,800 --> 01:16:11,670
- With whom?
- I'm vital to his development as an artist.

829
01:16:11,760 --> 01:16:14,670
So, too, you will find, am I.

830
01:16:14,760 --> 01:16:18,590
I would remind you that I have saved
your husband from bankruptcy.

831
01:16:21,360 --> 01:16:23,950
I am delighted to help Mr Wagner as well

832
01:16:24,880 --> 01:16:29,670
but to not to cut my hands like a groom
so that he may more easily mount the mare.

833
01:16:29,760 --> 01:16:33,950
- I have never loved Eugene.
- No, Daughter, but I have.

834
01:16:38,760 --> 01:16:41,270
Vital to his development indeed!

835
01:16:48,960 --> 01:16:53,270
I shall shoot the fellow should he dare to
show his face in Bordeaux ever again.

836
01:16:53,360 --> 01:16:55,310
I shall indeed!

837
01:16:58,000 --> 01:17:01,230
C'est quelque chose dont j'avais toujours...

838
01:17:57,480 --> 01:17:59,430
Stop!

839
01:18:06,600 --> 01:18:08,950
Yes?

840
01:18:09,920 --> 01:18:12,270
Yes?!

841
01:18:15,200 --> 01:18:17,660
You are Richard Wagner of Dresden?

842
01:18:17,760 --> 01:18:19,710
I am.

843
01:18:19,800 --> 01:18:22,990
If you are here to dun me, a bailiff,
I'm getting money.

844
01:18:23,080 --> 01:18:26,620
I have a letter of credit
from a friend in Weimar.

845
01:18:26,720 --> 01:18:30,500
The composer and pianist, Franz Liszt.
I expect...

846
01:18:30,600 --> 01:18:32,550
Please, please...

847
01:18:33,480 --> 01:18:37,870
- It is not money?
- It is by nature of being political

848
01:18:37,960 --> 01:18:39,910
touching on state and power,

849
01:18:40,000 --> 01:18:44,430
which I am encouraged, as a guardian,
to pursue with zest and power

850
01:18:44,520 --> 01:18:48,060
and to ask you these... several questions.

851
01:18:49,160 --> 01:18:51,110
Might I put them to you now, hmm?

852
01:18:54,400 --> 01:18:56,700
Why have you come back to Paris?

853
01:18:56,800 --> 01:19:00,470
What have your reasons been,
apart from romantic,

854
01:19:00,560 --> 01:19:02,510
for being in Bordeaux?

855
01:19:02,600 --> 01:19:07,190
And have you tried
to communicate with any here

856
01:19:07,280 --> 01:19:09,470
- on the list?
- List?

857
01:19:09,560 --> 01:19:13,990
The list here given of known
revolutionary-inclined persons

858
01:19:14,080 --> 01:19:16,030
in alphabetical order.

859
01:19:18,760 --> 01:19:20,710
I was only a... spectator.

860
01:19:20,800 --> 01:19:23,230
Read it carefully, Herr Wagner,

861
01:19:24,400 --> 01:19:28,750
and when you have finished,
I will escort you from Paris.

862
01:19:29,840 --> 01:19:31,510
Ah.

863
01:19:31,600 --> 01:19:33,550
Tannhäuser.

864
01:19:33,640 --> 01:19:35,590
Now, this is splendid.

865
01:19:35,680 --> 01:19:37,710
Revolutionary, one might say.

866
01:19:39,360 --> 01:19:43,870
I am by way of being
an amateur musician myself.

867
01:19:43,960 --> 01:19:47,500
I am told that my friends
are to be executed in Dresden.

868
01:19:47,600 --> 01:19:50,990
Röckel, the others.
Do you know? Are they dead?

869
01:19:51,080 --> 01:19:54,390
They are not now to be executed,
merely imprisoned

870
01:19:54,480 --> 01:19:58,510
though I would execute them,
for I am implacable

871
01:19:58,600 --> 01:20:02,220
- as you were.
- One should be.

872
01:20:02,320 --> 01:20:05,430
Herr Wagner... might I warn you

873
01:20:05,520 --> 01:20:08,590
you are marked and will be watched
while you are on the list

874
01:20:08,680 --> 01:20:13,390
and every country has its own list
and its own influential people

875
01:20:13,480 --> 01:20:16,750
who need only to denounce you
as behaving suspiciously...

876
01:20:17,840 --> 01:20:20,300
as in Bordeaux, for instance.

877
01:20:20,400 --> 01:20:22,350
Hm? Hm?

878
01:20:22,440 --> 01:20:27,300
Mrs Taylor - or was it Mrs Ritter? - Her son
Karl has the makings of a fine musician.

879
01:20:27,400 --> 01:20:32,110
Well, no, he hasn't the makings
of a very fine anything -

880
01:20:32,200 --> 01:20:34,760
but, for the sake of 3,000 francs a year...

881
01:20:34,840 --> 01:20:37,590
Hmm.

882
01:20:39,560 --> 01:20:41,710
- Might I take this?
- Please do.

883
01:20:42,960 --> 01:20:45,310
- With a signature?
- Where am I to go?

884
01:20:45,400 --> 01:20:47,590
Herr Wagner, you may go where you wish

885
01:20:47,680 --> 01:20:51,220
but you may not go to Bordeaux,
where you were going.

886
01:20:52,400 --> 01:20:54,350
A signature.

887
01:20:54,440 --> 01:20:56,390
I was going east.

888
01:20:56,480 --> 01:21:01,150
- I am told your wife will arrive soon in Paris.
- Wife?

889
01:21:01,240 --> 01:21:06,830
Wife? My wife writes to me, asking that
I should not use any familiarity or affection

890
01:21:06,920 --> 01:21:09,070
in my correspondence with her.

891
01:21:09,920 --> 01:21:15,310
In my letters, I should address her formally,
as to a stranger met in the street. Wife?

892
01:21:15,400 --> 01:21:19,020
Might I suggest, Herr Wagner,
that for your safety

893
01:21:19,120 --> 01:21:21,870
you should move on perhaps, say, to...

894
01:21:21,960 --> 01:21:23,910
Switzerland?

895
01:21:27,000 --> 01:21:28,950
Yes.

896
01:21:55,880 --> 01:21:59,990
'Switzerland was congenial to Wagner.

897
01:22:00,080 --> 01:22:03,190
'He suffered from ill health all his life

898
01:22:03,280 --> 01:22:05,070
'and, like others before him

899
01:22:05,160 --> 01:22:08,070
'thrashed his body with healthy pursuits -

900
01:22:08,160 --> 01:22:13,750
'in Switzerland with Minna, with two pupils
taken in to earn a modest living.

901
01:22:14,680 --> 01:22:17,510
'One of them was Hans von Bülow,

902
01:22:17,600 --> 01:22:19,630
'a law student from Leipzig.

903
01:22:19,720 --> 01:22:24,840
'The other, Karl Ritter,
the son of Frau Ritter here in Dresden.

904
01:22:24,920 --> 01:22:29,780
'At whose house Wagner had first met
Jessie Laussot.

905
01:22:29,880 --> 01:22:34,870
'He had rowed a boat one day across
from Lucerne to the William Tell chapel.

906
01:22:34,960 --> 01:22:41,190
'Ln the boat, Franz Liszt,
Wagner's foremost champion, always. '

907
01:22:47,040 --> 01:22:50,030
My dear friend. My dear friend.

908
01:22:51,080 --> 01:22:53,030
What it is to have you with us.

909
01:22:59,800 --> 01:23:02,230
Why does he smile so?

910
01:23:02,320 --> 01:23:03,950
He's happy.

911
01:23:04,040 --> 01:23:06,070
Is he?

912
01:23:06,160 --> 01:23:07,430
No.

913
01:23:07,520 --> 01:23:11,550
Wagner, the gentleman is very wealthy.

914
01:23:11,640 --> 01:23:15,590
- Which gentleman?
- The gentleman I tell you of.

915
01:23:15,680 --> 01:23:17,630
Oh, that?

916
01:23:17,720 --> 01:23:19,670
It would be difficult for me.

917
01:23:20,760 --> 01:23:24,950
I have taken considerable trouble
with the hereditary Grand Duchess Sophie

918
01:23:25,040 --> 01:23:29,830
and she is becoming a most accomplished
prima donna assoluta, as it were.

919
01:23:29,920 --> 01:23:34,230
- As it were?
- Well, she can sing...

920
01:23:34,320 --> 01:23:35,990
un peu.

921
01:23:36,080 --> 01:23:37,470
Fort peu.

922
01:23:45,200 --> 01:23:49,870
I think the Duke of Sachsen-Coburg-Gotha
will pay you well

923
01:23:49,960 --> 01:23:51,910
for scoring his new opera.

924
01:23:52,000 --> 01:23:54,750
My dearest,
I'm sure he will and so he should.

925
01:23:54,840 --> 01:23:57,400
What was his last opera called? Tony?

926
01:23:57,480 --> 01:23:59,430
Yes. Tony, yes.

927
01:23:59,520 --> 01:24:03,140
He's particularly intent on copying
your magnificent use of trombone.

928
01:24:03,240 --> 01:24:05,310
Is he? Who?

929
01:24:05,400 --> 01:24:07,750
Le Duc de Coburg.

930
01:24:07,840 --> 01:24:10,550
- Who is your dear friend and patron.
- Yes.

931
01:24:10,640 --> 01:24:13,430
He's a close relative of Grand Duke Carl.

932
01:24:14,480 --> 01:24:16,750
- And a dolt.
- Pardon?

933
01:24:16,840 --> 01:24:20,190
Only a dolt would copy
the use of trombones.

934
01:24:21,280 --> 01:24:24,030
He asked me to find out your rules
in this respect

935
01:24:24,120 --> 01:24:26,470
that he might apply them in his own work.

936
01:24:26,560 --> 01:24:30,070
Work? He has no work.
What a doltish question.

937
01:24:30,160 --> 01:24:33,470
How can you ask me
such a doltish question, Liszt?

938
01:24:34,560 --> 01:24:36,510
Loyauté m'oblige.

939
01:24:36,600 --> 01:24:38,870
I assured my royal patron that I would.

940
01:24:38,960 --> 01:24:40,910
Did you?

941
01:24:41,000 --> 01:24:42,950
Well, you tell him this, then.

942
01:24:43,040 --> 01:24:46,190
Tell the royal buffoon
that I never use a trombone

943
01:24:46,280 --> 01:24:48,580
unless I have an idea for a trombone.

944
01:24:48,680 --> 01:24:50,870
One just doesn't use trombones.

945
01:24:50,960 --> 01:24:54,830
Tell him also that I am searching
for a prince who will support me

946
01:24:54,920 --> 01:24:59,110
not through my work on whatever "work"
he may be amusing himself with.

947
01:24:59,200 --> 01:25:02,980
I want a prince who will support me...
undemandingly,

948
01:25:03,080 --> 01:25:05,350
unconditionally, unquestioningly.

949
01:25:05,440 --> 01:25:09,140
By which I mean money, Liszt -
money, money, money, Liszt.

950
01:25:09,240 --> 01:25:11,190
All I want is money.

951
01:25:11,920 --> 01:25:14,950
Love, I abandon. And art.

952
01:25:15,040 --> 01:25:17,150
And politics?

953
01:25:17,240 --> 01:25:19,510
Ah, politics has abandoned me.

954
01:25:40,120 --> 01:25:42,550
Why do you smile when I talk of Goethe?

955
01:25:45,400 --> 01:25:49,180
He smiled all through lunch
when we discussed Goethe. Why?

956
01:25:50,240 --> 01:25:52,190
Because I have...

957
01:25:52,280 --> 01:25:54,230
a deep admiration of Goethe.

958
01:25:54,320 --> 01:25:56,270
Do you? And for France?

959
01:25:57,920 --> 01:26:03,790
If you are not prepared to accept
that France is the cultural leader of Europe

960
01:26:03,880 --> 01:26:05,870
then you are a baboon.

961
01:26:06,800 --> 01:26:08,830
You certainly grin like one.

962
01:26:08,920 --> 01:26:13,230
Never, never argue with Liszt
about Goethe or the French.

963
01:26:13,320 --> 01:26:16,670
I never do, Karl.

964
01:26:38,920 --> 01:26:41,830
- Karl, you must not.
- My dear Frau Wagner...

965
01:26:41,920 --> 01:26:45,190
I must demand, and get,
an apology from him.

966
01:26:45,280 --> 01:26:48,630
Liszt is one of the kindest, gentlest of men.

967
01:26:48,720 --> 01:26:51,070
He would not dream of insulting you.

968
01:26:51,160 --> 01:26:54,510
I have communicated the outrage
to my mother. He...

969
01:26:55,600 --> 01:26:57,550
He called me a baboon.

970
01:26:57,640 --> 01:26:59,590
Baboon face.

971
01:26:59,680 --> 01:27:04,510
- Surely it isn't all that important. Surely not.
- Yes, it is. It is.

972
01:27:04,600 --> 01:27:06,550
I am to be married.

973
01:27:06,640 --> 01:27:08,670
I cannot be treated in this way.

974
01:27:08,760 --> 01:27:11,790
Marry? Ought you to, Ritter?

975
01:27:11,880 --> 01:27:14,550
Ladies and gentlemen...

976
01:27:14,640 --> 01:27:17,950
this telegraph
has been received from Weimar.

977
01:27:18,040 --> 01:27:21,740
It is a poem
to mark the occasion of Liszt's birthday.

978
01:27:21,840 --> 01:27:24,300
It will be read by one of our own poets -

979
01:27:24,400 --> 01:27:26,350
Georg Herwegh.

980
01:27:33,000 --> 01:27:37,630
The Lovers Blessed
by Hofmann von Fallesleben.

981
01:27:38,720 --> 01:27:42,070
In every nest where lovers dwell

982
01:27:42,160 --> 01:27:45,390
- Togetherness...
- Karl is very upset, Richard.

983
01:27:45,480 --> 01:27:47,430
Is he?

984
01:27:47,520 --> 01:27:51,300
- As a boy, he was called "baboon-face".
- Was he?

985
01:27:52,240 --> 01:27:55,830
Spring begets each mother's dwelling...

986
01:27:55,920 --> 01:27:57,870
With fresh, green blooms.

987
01:27:57,960 --> 01:28:00,710
The young fool isn't going to make a scene,
is he?

988
01:28:00,800 --> 01:28:04,030
So may we each stretch out our hand

989
01:28:04,120 --> 01:28:07,710
As we are led to the better land.

990
01:29:13,720 --> 01:29:15,390
Wagner! Wagner!

991
01:29:15,480 --> 01:29:19,100
Is it often
that you have to play for your supper?

992
01:29:20,200 --> 01:29:22,630
Wagner, well done. Far too well done.

993
01:29:22,720 --> 01:29:25,670
I would much rather
these things be done badly.

994
01:29:25,760 --> 01:29:27,790
- Francois!
- In what respect?

995
01:29:27,880 --> 01:29:31,190
In every respect,
that I better form my opinions.

996
01:29:31,280 --> 01:29:32,790
Ah.

997
01:29:32,880 --> 01:29:36,150
How can one correctly appreciate
and criticise

998
01:29:36,240 --> 01:29:40,110
when seduced by the excellence
of Frau Heim and yourself?

999
01:29:40,200 --> 01:29:42,150
Yes, and Liszt.

1000
01:29:42,240 --> 01:29:46,020
Oh, I think Liszt played badly.
One could see the genius, but...

1001
01:29:46,120 --> 01:29:48,990
Frau Wills, I am concerned as to your...

1002
01:29:51,440 --> 01:29:53,390
Heine?

1003
01:29:53,480 --> 01:29:56,950
Has the poet Heine,
the great German poet, Heine...

1004
01:29:57,040 --> 01:29:59,950
- Madame, I am aware...
- Heine?

1005
01:30:00,040 --> 01:30:03,190
Has Heine been of any influence
in Herr Wagner's...

1006
01:30:03,280 --> 01:30:05,630
Wagner? It is the birthday of Liszt.

1007
01:30:05,720 --> 01:30:10,870
- I have the highest regard for the poet.
- We think very little of the poet, Heine.

1008
01:30:10,960 --> 01:30:13,710
But Heine has captured the German people.

1009
01:30:17,320 --> 01:30:22,150
Karl, you must not make a scene.
I will make Liszt aware of your feelings.

1010
01:30:22,240 --> 01:30:26,270
I am sure he will apologise in his own way,
possibly by letter.

1011
01:30:26,360 --> 01:30:28,310
I shall demand an apology now.

1012
01:30:28,400 --> 01:30:32,150
If I do not get one, my mother
will not give you another penny.

1013
01:30:32,240 --> 01:30:34,750
- No, no, wait!
- Why talk about Heine?

1014
01:30:34,840 --> 01:30:39,110
Surely his name will be inscribed
in the temple of immortality.

1015
01:30:39,200 --> 01:30:41,150
I suppose so.

1016
01:30:41,240 --> 01:30:43,150
In shit.

1017
01:30:55,440 --> 01:31:00,430
Are we not making too much of it?
After all, the boy does look like a baboon.

1018
01:31:32,680 --> 01:31:37,070
For years, I had in mind the story
of a young man, a boy of great charm -

1019
01:31:37,160 --> 01:31:41,030
of great charm and beauty.
Without beauty, there is nothing.

1020
01:31:41,120 --> 01:31:44,470
My Siegfried is above all those things.

1021
01:31:44,560 --> 01:31:45,670
Beautiful.

1022
01:31:45,760 --> 01:31:49,460
No knowledge of fear.
A boy too stupid to learn fear.

1023
01:31:49,560 --> 01:31:52,670
Whenever I have the opportunity
to hear the Master play

1024
01:31:52,760 --> 01:31:56,230
- I am aware of the gift God has given him...
- Too kind.

1025
01:31:56,320 --> 01:32:01,230
- We should all pray our thanks to God...
- I abase myself before you, ma chere.

1026
01:32:01,320 --> 01:32:04,190
What is Siegfried's guardian like? What?

1027
01:32:04,280 --> 01:32:07,670
Small and bent of course,
deformed, and he hobbles.

1028
01:32:07,760 --> 01:32:10,630
His... His head is huge -

1029
01:32:10,720 --> 01:32:16,110
a great bald head with his small and
shark-like glancing eyes going to the soul.

1030
01:32:17,200 --> 01:32:20,740
Festooned with a grey beard.
The embodiment of evil.

1031
01:32:20,840 --> 01:32:24,190
He does... He does, of course,
resemble us to a hair.

1032
01:32:24,280 --> 01:32:26,230
In Weimar, I am told

1033
01:32:26,320 --> 01:32:31,830
they plan to institute
a festival of music, opera and art

1034
01:32:31,920 --> 01:32:35,540
for to enjoy the whole people of Germany
and also to cultivate.

1035
01:32:35,640 --> 01:32:37,590
Yes, one would hope so.

1036
01:32:37,680 --> 01:32:39,630
A transformation is needed.

1037
01:32:39,720 --> 01:32:43,500
Music must go through
a real transformation.

1038
01:32:43,600 --> 01:32:45,950
What is needed more than anything,
however

1039
01:32:46,040 --> 01:32:47,990
is a transformation...

1040
01:32:48,080 --> 01:32:50,030
in theatre.

1041
01:32:50,120 --> 01:32:52,070
Listen to me, damn you!

1042
01:32:52,160 --> 01:32:53,550
Damn you!

1043
01:32:53,640 --> 01:32:55,910
Listen to me!

1044
01:32:56,000 --> 01:32:57,950
I'm Wagner!

1045
01:33:07,720 --> 01:33:10,390
- Herr Wagner...
- 'In 1851...

1046
01:33:10,480 --> 01:33:15,790
- Herr Wagner?!
- '... Wagner's health gave out... entirely.

1047
01:33:15,880 --> 01:33:21,550
'Entirely. He was forced
to spend two months in a sanatorium

1048
01:33:21,640 --> 01:33:23,310
'to take the water cure

1049
01:33:23,400 --> 01:33:25,910
'to stride the mountains when fit enough

1050
01:33:27,000 --> 01:33:29,670
'but he suffered from shingles, you see.

1051
01:33:30,720 --> 01:33:33,310
'He suffered from constipation.

1052
01:33:33,400 --> 01:33:36,910
'He suffered also from gastric ulcers

1053
01:33:37,000 --> 01:33:39,560
'but most of all

1054
01:33:39,640 --> 01:33:44,110
'he suffered from black, hounding despair.

1055
01:33:45,560 --> 01:33:49,470
'He had written no music
for almost five years.

1056
01:33:49,560 --> 01:33:52,070
'Lf he could but return to Germany...

1057
01:33:53,440 --> 01:33:55,390
'But he could not.

1058
01:33:55,480 --> 01:33:59,670
'He was still listed here in Dresden
as a revolutionary criminal

1059
01:34:00,600 --> 01:34:04,030
'but Semper, the architect of the barricades,
joined him

1060
01:34:04,120 --> 01:34:08,670
'and another revolutionary friend,
Hermann Müller

1061
01:34:08,760 --> 01:34:11,470
'and there was always the pupil, Karl Ritter,

1062
01:34:11,560 --> 01:34:13,510
'upon whose money

1063
01:34:13,600 --> 01:34:17,070
'or rather that of his mother, Frau Ritter,

1064
01:34:17,160 --> 01:34:19,110
'Wagner depended.

1065
01:34:20,000 --> 01:34:25,550
'They tried to cheer him on his trudges
through the snow above the clouds...

1066
01:34:26,400 --> 01:34:28,470
'and sometimes did.

1067
01:34:28,560 --> 01:34:30,310
'He wrote somewhere...

1068
01:34:30,400 --> 01:34:32,350
"'Determined

1069
01:34:32,440 --> 01:34:36,030
"'I shall return to Zurich to die...

1070
01:34:37,120 --> 01:34:39,070
"'or to compose. "'

1071
01:34:56,840 --> 01:34:59,510
I am on the point of...

1072
01:34:59,600 --> 01:35:00,820
vomit!

1073
01:35:00,920 --> 01:35:04,700
Altitude. You were not given
a head for heights, Ritter.

1074
01:35:04,800 --> 01:35:09,630
He is some help. Liszt has recommended
someone else - a young man, Bülow.

1075
01:35:09,720 --> 01:35:11,670
He may be more...

1076
01:35:11,760 --> 01:35:14,430
But this one's mother pays well, Semper.

1077
01:35:14,520 --> 01:35:16,470
Pays well. Semper!

1078
01:35:16,560 --> 01:35:18,510
Look at it.

1079
01:35:46,560 --> 01:35:49,230
Every theatre should tumble before this

1080
01:35:49,320 --> 01:35:53,630
and come the day when every German
theatre does tumble, you and I -

1081
01:35:53,720 --> 01:35:56,070
you with your prams, I with my ideas -

1082
01:35:56,160 --> 01:35:59,230
we come up here and hurl rocks
we cannot yet heft

1083
01:35:59,320 --> 01:36:02,110
with such strength
that they will reach the Rhine

1084
01:36:02,200 --> 01:36:04,150
and, there, slot into place.

1085
01:36:05,240 --> 01:36:08,230
We'll blow horns to call our friends together

1086
01:36:08,320 --> 01:36:11,470
and perform three dramas
in the course of a week

1087
01:36:11,560 --> 01:36:14,790
which shall proclaim
the artwork of the future.

1088
01:36:24,680 --> 01:36:26,630
Got away. By the very nick.

1089
01:36:26,720 --> 01:36:30,830
The nick.
I am now without money and a refugee.

1090
01:36:31,880 --> 01:36:33,830
I haven't a penny to spare.

1091
01:36:33,920 --> 01:36:38,270
- Not one. Not one.
- Neither have I. I'm destitute.

1092
01:36:38,360 --> 01:36:40,740
Not entirely.

1093
01:36:40,840 --> 01:36:43,070
I am given to rages.

1094
01:36:43,160 --> 01:36:45,670
I am covered with the most beastly rash.

1095
01:36:46,760 --> 01:36:48,990
I'm writing a... play.

1096
01:36:49,080 --> 01:36:51,030
I suffer from...

1097
01:36:51,120 --> 01:36:53,470
- pressure of the blood.
- I also.

1098
01:36:53,560 --> 01:36:55,510
Yes, yes, and more than that.

1099
01:36:55,600 --> 01:36:57,790
An alarming, feverish activity.

1100
01:37:00,360 --> 01:37:04,710
For my shingles,
I have been taking sulphur.

1101
01:37:04,800 --> 01:37:07,630
So much so that I sweat sulphur.

1102
01:37:07,720 --> 01:37:09,350
Doctors...

1103
01:37:09,440 --> 01:37:11,390
they give me poisons.

1104
01:37:11,480 --> 01:37:15,550
I'm not convinced that
this... water is the answer.

1105
01:37:30,120 --> 01:37:33,710
Er, this opera, composing and such,

1106
01:37:34,640 --> 01:37:36,590
are you still at it?

1107
01:37:36,680 --> 01:37:38,630
I am.

1108
01:37:38,720 --> 01:37:41,590
Do you still hope for change?

1109
01:37:41,680 --> 01:37:45,380
No, I do not hope for change.
There is no hope for change.

1110
01:37:45,480 --> 01:37:50,270
"The world is only of physical, no moral,
significance. " Then why seek to change it?

1111
01:37:50,360 --> 01:37:53,110
Down, gentlemen, please.

1112
01:38:01,760 --> 01:38:06,350
I confess, I do not understand one word
of Herr Schopenhauer.

1113
01:38:06,440 --> 01:38:08,030
Oh, do you not?

1114
01:38:08,120 --> 01:38:13,590
Herr Wagner thinks it's very important. He's
read this book five times in nine months.

1115
01:38:13,680 --> 01:38:15,950
Have you read it?

1116
01:38:16,040 --> 01:38:18,470
Down, gentlemen, please.

1117
01:38:30,120 --> 01:38:34,550
I think it impresses him
because it fortifies his own view of himself -

1118
01:38:34,640 --> 01:38:36,910
a genius, some would say a madman -

1119
01:38:37,920 --> 01:38:39,870
but given the superfluity

1120
01:38:39,960 --> 01:38:42,830
of knowledge and artistic insight

1121
01:38:42,920 --> 01:38:46,350
beyond the normal trivialities of paying bills
and...

1122
01:38:46,440 --> 01:38:48,390
earning a living...

1123
01:38:49,480 --> 01:38:52,310
and, it would seem, breathing.

1124
01:38:55,000 --> 01:38:58,110
"Suicide - the supreme assertion of the will.

1125
01:38:58,200 --> 01:39:02,190
"Sacrifice and denial of the will to live. "
Stay down, all of you!

1126
01:39:02,280 --> 01:39:04,070
I must live on...

1127
01:39:04,160 --> 01:39:05,910
and suffer.

1128
01:42:18,840 --> 01:42:21,790
Naughty Richard. Poor Minna.

1129
01:42:37,800 --> 01:42:41,500
In the mornings, I work.
In the afternoons, I walk. You?

1130
01:42:41,600 --> 01:42:45,830
I work through the night into the morning,
until I am exhausted.

1131
01:42:45,920 --> 01:42:49,950
- I would ask you to work in the afternoons.
- Why?

1132
01:42:50,040 --> 01:42:53,660
- I am Richard Wagner.
- Success to you.

1133
01:42:53,760 --> 01:42:57,990
- I am a gunsmith.
- I've never had need of... guns.

1134
01:42:58,080 --> 01:43:01,110
The pen being mightier than the sword?

1135
01:43:01,200 --> 01:43:03,950
Beating swords into ploughshares.

1136
01:43:05,040 --> 01:43:06,990
So long as man strives

1137
01:43:07,080 --> 01:43:10,030
he makes mistakes.

1138
01:43:10,120 --> 01:43:14,270
Every man is worth studying carefully,
but not every man is worth

1139
01:43:14,360 --> 01:43:15,830
talking to.

1140
01:43:15,920 --> 01:43:17,870
Good day, sir.

1141
01:43:41,240 --> 01:43:46,310
I... I often think a rich merchant
such as yourself is allowed his prosperity,

1142
01:43:46,400 --> 01:43:48,350
Wesendonck...

1143
01:43:48,440 --> 01:43:53,910
that he might come to the aid of fine artists
such as Herr Wagner.

1144
01:43:54,000 --> 01:43:55,950
I can find money for Wagner

1145
01:43:57,000 --> 01:44:02,020
but I would suggest that his wife be asked
to control that which we find for him.

1146
01:44:02,120 --> 01:44:04,070
Where is she?

1147
01:44:04,160 --> 01:44:06,430
I am told she is sickly, in Dresden.

1148
01:44:07,520 --> 01:44:09,470
Frau Wagner.

1149
01:44:10,400 --> 01:44:13,710
Herr Wagner is, in fact, a financial genius.

1150
01:44:13,800 --> 01:44:18,150
- You mean, in that he obtains money?
- In that he persuades money.

1151
01:44:18,240 --> 01:44:20,950
- Now, his wife...
- Otto, were I Wagner

1152
01:44:21,040 --> 01:44:24,350
I would hate to have my affairs
handled by my wife.

1153
01:44:24,440 --> 01:44:27,030
Indeed, any gentleman
would find it intolerable

1154
01:44:27,120 --> 01:44:30,510
though, of course,
in the case of Herr Wagner, hmm...

1155
01:44:31,600 --> 01:44:36,990
Do you know he borrowed
1,000 thalers from that booby, Ritter?

1156
01:44:38,080 --> 01:44:43,470
His mother already remits Wagner a stipend
for the musical education of the boy

1157
01:44:44,320 --> 01:44:47,710
as well as
in appreciation of Wagner's genius.

1158
01:44:48,800 --> 01:44:50,750
He is that.

1159
01:44:50,840 --> 01:44:52,790
My own wife tells me he is.

1160
01:44:54,400 --> 01:44:57,030
And my sensibility confirms it.

1161
01:44:58,600 --> 01:45:03,390
One person who does not appear
to know this is Wagner's own wife.

1162
01:45:03,480 --> 01:45:06,110
She sends him into despair, I'm told.

1163
01:45:06,200 --> 01:45:09,820
Will not live with him one minute,
cannot do without him the next.

1164
01:45:11,960 --> 01:45:15,350
I thank heaven for quiet order
in my own household.

1165
01:45:15,440 --> 01:45:20,190
Frau Wagner, she simply doesn't
understand the way he writes and writes

1166
01:45:20,280 --> 01:45:22,470
and cudgels his brains to shreds.

1167
01:45:23,560 --> 01:45:25,670
You know, it's not merely opera.

1168
01:45:25,760 --> 01:45:27,710
It's not merely music.

1169
01:45:27,800 --> 01:45:31,390
That man just... Well, he wants to
change everything.

1170
01:45:31,480 --> 01:45:35,430
But of course Wa-Wagner... is music.

1171
01:45:35,520 --> 01:45:38,870
Wagner, we discuss your finances.

1172
01:45:38,960 --> 01:45:40,830
Oh, yes?

1173
01:45:40,920 --> 01:45:42,870
Yes.

1174
01:45:42,960 --> 01:45:47,390
On trust that I shall be paid back
from future fees from your operas

1175
01:45:47,480 --> 01:45:50,350
I shall let you have 7,000 francs

1176
01:45:51,440 --> 01:45:54,230
which I trust will expunge your debts.

1177
01:45:54,320 --> 01:45:57,790
My, er... My dear Wesendonck,
I am grateful to you.

1178
01:45:57,880 --> 01:46:01,190
There is also the small matter
of some 500 francs -

1179
01:46:01,280 --> 01:46:04,030
I'd hoped to cover it
with a fee for Lohengrin -

1180
01:46:04,120 --> 01:46:08,710
to be paid tomorrow,
or they will throw me out of my humble...

1181
01:46:08,800 --> 01:46:13,110
Erm, can't sell the furniture.
Frau Wagner would never forgive me.

1182
01:46:13,200 --> 01:46:16,110
She has taken the cure.
I expect her any day.

1183
01:46:17,200 --> 01:46:20,150
Yes, yes, 500 francs.

1184
01:46:20,800 --> 01:46:22,910
Liszt does Lohengrin in Weimar.

1185
01:46:23,000 --> 01:46:24,950
Do you know I have never...

1186
01:46:25,840 --> 01:46:27,470
seen it?

1187
01:46:29,080 --> 01:46:31,460
Nothing to do with her!

1188
01:46:31,560 --> 01:46:35,230
Nothing! The threads
came together, that's all. Nothing!

1189
01:46:35,320 --> 01:46:37,430
Nothing to do with Mathilde Wesendonck!

1190
01:46:38,520 --> 01:46:40,470
'No, no, no. Never.

1191
01:46:40,560 --> 01:46:44,910
'There was nothing she gave me
except a summer house in her garden.

1192
01:46:45,000 --> 01:46:48,750
'That's all I had from her.
Nothing to do with her.

1193
01:46:52,360 --> 01:46:54,310
'I'm sorry, Minna.

1194
01:46:54,400 --> 01:46:57,940
'Sorry. Sorry for what I did to you.

1195
01:46:58,440 --> 01:47:00,070
'Sorry, Minna...

1196
01:47:01,000 --> 01:47:03,430
'Minna.

1197
01:47:03,520 --> 01:47:05,310
'Sorry, Minna. '

1198
01:47:07,680 --> 01:47:09,630
A house and garden on my own.

1199
01:47:12,360 --> 01:47:14,310
A haven of calm at last.

1200
01:47:16,360 --> 01:47:18,470
This shall be my last move of all.

1201
01:47:21,200 --> 01:47:23,150
Wagner, my dear friend!

1202
01:47:23,240 --> 01:47:25,190
I have something to show you.

1203
01:47:28,920 --> 01:47:32,110
Ah, of course I shall pay you rent.

1204
01:47:33,400 --> 01:47:37,070
- Of course.
- And I shall never put on livery again.

1205
01:47:37,160 --> 01:47:42,150
How I detested those breeches and
those stockings and those buckled boots.

1206
01:47:42,240 --> 01:47:44,190
Most insulting to a man.

1207
01:47:44,280 --> 01:47:46,230
Now it is silk.

1208
01:47:46,320 --> 01:47:49,670
Do you know, Herr Wesendonck?
You must know. You sell silk.

1209
01:47:49,760 --> 01:47:54,430
You must know how important silk is to me.
It is the only thing I can wear.

1210
01:47:54,520 --> 01:47:58,470
I'm mortified beyond endurance
if forced to wear anything else.

1211
01:47:58,560 --> 01:48:03,420
Covered in scrofula. Only the finest stuff.
And you would know the finest stuff.

1212
01:48:03,520 --> 01:48:05,630
How well you have done from silk.

1213
01:48:05,720 --> 01:48:08,870
And here you see me,
who cannot live without it.

1214
01:49:31,640 --> 01:49:33,590
It's Good Friday.

1215
01:49:33,680 --> 01:49:38,470
It isn't. Church bells are not rung
on Good Friday.

1216
01:49:38,560 --> 01:49:40,510
Yes, it is. Yes, it is.

1217
01:49:40,600 --> 01:49:42,550
Yes, it is.

1218
01:49:44,880 --> 01:49:47,340
- Well...
- Well?

1219
01:49:48,400 --> 01:49:50,350
Isn't it better here?

1220
01:49:50,440 --> 01:49:52,390
Yes.

1221
01:49:54,400 --> 01:49:56,350
Aren't you happy here?

1222
01:49:57,800 --> 01:50:00,430
I had a letter from Doctor Pusinelli
in Dresden.

1223
01:50:00,520 --> 01:50:02,950
Yes? How is the dear man?

1224
01:50:03,040 --> 01:50:06,150
He thinks I take too much laudanum.

1225
01:50:06,240 --> 01:50:08,540
I think that.

1226
01:50:08,640 --> 01:50:11,270
You still owe him a great deal of money.

1227
01:50:11,360 --> 01:50:13,710
He works for your reinstatement.

1228
01:50:15,120 --> 01:50:16,670
What?

1229
01:50:16,760 --> 01:50:19,320
That you might be taken back.

1230
01:50:20,400 --> 01:50:21,870
Back?

1231
01:50:21,960 --> 01:50:25,870
As Kapellmeister. It's my dearest wish.

1232
01:50:25,960 --> 01:50:28,310
Not too much laudanum.

1233
01:50:30,360 --> 01:50:32,230
What have you there?

1234
01:50:32,320 --> 01:50:36,910
It's a gold pen,
given to me by Frau Wesendonck.

1235
01:50:40,240 --> 01:50:41,830
How kind.

1236
01:50:44,160 --> 01:50:45,550
How kind.

1237
01:50:50,240 --> 01:50:53,270
'I see thee in thy gorgeousness,

1238
01:50:53,360 --> 01:50:57,830
'hear all those who will never understand
what we are to each other.

1239
01:50:58,560 --> 01:51:02,750
'Those who strangers are, yet near to us,

1240
01:51:03,480 --> 01:51:06,910
'how dare they speak to us,
speak between us?

1241
01:51:07,680 --> 01:51:14,070
'They voyage the questing, the voyaging
we do, you and I, my sweet child.

1242
01:51:15,680 --> 01:51:19,790
'Though dreams of you crowd in,
set sail with me.

1243
01:51:21,200 --> 01:51:23,500
'Does my dear muse stay afar still?

1244
01:51:24,960 --> 01:51:29,590
'Ln silence I await your visit,
send you my barque to transport you.

1245
01:51:32,400 --> 01:51:34,270
'Together in our boat we voyaged,

1246
01:51:34,360 --> 01:51:41,990
'no longer was I alone, a lonely heart,
no longer the Dutchman, wherever you are. '

1247
01:51:54,320 --> 01:51:56,880
'Everyone loves you,

1248
01:51:56,960 --> 01:51:58,710
'You love many.

1249
01:51:58,800 --> 01:52:01,510
'Your being as the sun is shown,

1250
01:52:01,600 --> 01:52:05,030
'Whose smile brings every joy and blessing.

1251
01:52:06,280 --> 01:52:09,350
'My heart loves you and you alone.

1252
01:52:11,040 --> 01:52:14,910
'So tenderly, so heart to heart,

1253
01:52:15,000 --> 01:52:17,670
'You kissed me in my dream.

1254
01:52:17,760 --> 01:52:24,310
'I feel it still, that love-true kiss,
awakened though I seem.

1255
01:52:26,760 --> 01:52:32,510
'And yet in life my waiting mouth
Your lips have scarce brushed o'er.

1256
01:52:33,560 --> 01:52:41,350
'No look, no cry revealed to you
How sad my heart and sore.

1257
01:52:41,440 --> 01:52:45,790
'O, do not scorn the dream that gives
High courage to my mood.

1258
01:52:48,360 --> 01:52:53,380
'Life looks on me with hateful eyes
The dream alone is good.

1259
01:52:56,040 --> 01:53:03,460
'Then what is falsehood, what is truth?
What life, and what dream stuff?

1260
01:53:04,640 --> 01:53:10,230
'Let me go dreaming on and on
For I have lived enough.

1261
01:53:12,640 --> 01:53:14,590
'Mathilde Wesendonck. '

1262
01:55:54,960 --> 01:55:58,470
What does that creature
spoilt by happiness mean to you?

1263
01:55:58,560 --> 01:56:02,910
Minna, please. You must understand
she means everything.

1264
01:56:03,000 --> 01:56:06,110
That poor man.

1265
01:56:06,200 --> 01:56:08,270
I don't understand.

1266
01:56:09,880 --> 01:56:12,630
You treat him like a servant.

1267
01:56:12,720 --> 01:56:16,950
She treats me like a person
unfit to meet socially.

1268
01:56:17,040 --> 01:56:19,630
You imagine everything.

1269
01:56:20,720 --> 01:56:23,070
I see.

1270
01:56:24,760 --> 01:56:28,300
Very well. I shall go away.

1271
01:56:29,840 --> 01:56:33,030
You must stay
and make an honest woman of her.

1272
01:56:40,840 --> 01:56:42,950
Here is another letter come.

1273
01:57:13,000 --> 01:57:15,070
You're not well.

1274
01:57:17,840 --> 01:57:19,510
No.

1275
01:57:21,040 --> 01:57:22,510
Not at all.

1276
01:57:22,600 --> 01:57:24,550
This cannot continue.

1277
01:57:27,560 --> 01:57:30,990
No, it cannot.

1278
01:57:42,760 --> 01:57:44,590
What is that?

1279
01:57:48,360 --> 01:57:50,350
A drawing, a sketch.

1280
01:57:52,280 --> 01:57:54,030
Where does it go?

1281
01:57:54,120 --> 01:57:56,470
To Frau Wesendonck.

1282
01:57:58,280 --> 01:58:01,390
No, it... doesn't!

1283
01:58:09,720 --> 01:58:11,150
Minna.

1284
01:58:12,440 --> 01:58:14,030
Minna!

1285
01:58:14,120 --> 01:58:17,350
Please try to behave properly
in front of the servants.

1286
01:58:17,440 --> 01:58:20,910
Such behaviour is not understood
by people like the Wesendoncks.

1287
01:58:21,000 --> 01:58:23,630
They don't live that kind of life.

1288
01:58:25,400 --> 01:58:28,940
Such behaviour is unknown to them.

1289
01:58:30,040 --> 01:58:35,270
- You are surely ill.
- You cannot talk me round any more.

1290
01:58:37,280 --> 01:58:40,870
Our intercourse has never violated morals,
Minna.

1291
01:58:41,640 --> 01:58:43,830
Minna, do you hear?

1292
01:58:43,920 --> 01:58:45,430
Minna!

1293
01:58:48,240 --> 01:58:53,510
I shall not deny our love, but it is chaste.
Has never become carnal.

1294
01:59:09,960 --> 01:59:12,790
My wife, were she well,

1295
01:59:12,880 --> 01:59:16,230
would thank you as I do, for your kindness
in giving me luncheon.

1296
01:59:18,520 --> 01:59:23,270
Dear God, how I wish
they'd leave my work alone.

1297
01:59:23,360 --> 01:59:28,830
If they can't,
why do they think to please me by this?

1298
01:59:30,040 --> 01:59:33,470
- My God, I regret ever...
- Surely it is better to have it given...

1299
01:59:33,560 --> 01:59:36,630
What do you know about it, Wesendonck?
What?

1300
01:59:37,600 --> 01:59:42,790
Do I presume to tell you about silk?
How much in length?

1301
01:59:42,880 --> 01:59:46,310
If the conversation touched
upon the merchandising of silk,

1302
01:59:46,400 --> 01:59:49,190
would you ever hear utterance from me?

1303
01:59:57,600 --> 02:00:02,230
I cannot go on with it.
I cannot see a way forward.

1304
02:00:02,320 --> 02:00:05,230
I'm stuck with it. The Ring.

1305
02:00:15,400 --> 02:00:18,030
I'm in a parlous state for money.

1306
02:00:18,120 --> 02:00:22,950
Parlous. Once again, I have none.

1307
02:00:23,040 --> 02:00:28,030
How it goes. Those who said they would
publish me now say they will not.

1308
02:00:28,120 --> 02:00:31,150
So I am advanced nothing,
nothing, nothing at all,

1309
02:00:31,240 --> 02:00:32,990
not a coin,

1310
02:00:33,080 --> 02:00:39,030
though it is read, published and read,
and even performed in parts, in the bushes.

1311
02:00:43,200 --> 02:00:47,270
I need money now. A performance now.

1312
02:00:47,360 --> 02:00:50,470
I shall write a popular work
for ready money.

1313
02:00:52,240 --> 02:00:58,550
This woman, this beautiful creature,
who has come into my life to be my muse.

1314
02:00:58,640 --> 02:01:00,870
We must come to some agreement
about her.

1315
02:01:00,960 --> 02:01:03,520
Some arrangement must be made.

1316
02:01:03,600 --> 02:01:07,350
I think we should... share her.

1317
02:01:41,000 --> 02:01:43,230
You use my house as your own.

1318
02:01:46,080 --> 02:01:48,540
I am put out.

1319
02:01:48,640 --> 02:01:53,790
I would wish to have said this to you
in private, but there you have it.

1320
02:01:55,680 --> 02:01:59,460
Now said in company
where I would not wish to have said it.

1321
02:02:00,920 --> 02:02:03,270
Otto knows about our affection.

1322
02:02:04,400 --> 02:02:08,830
I have no secrets from him,
the father of my children.

1323
02:02:08,920 --> 02:02:11,550
Quite so, quite so.

1324
02:02:11,640 --> 02:02:15,230
Do you know what is being done
in your house, Otto?

1325
02:02:15,320 --> 02:02:17,700
What it is we do together?

1326
02:02:19,360 --> 02:02:23,950
The Legend of Tristan and Isolde.
A simple work.

1327
02:02:25,920 --> 02:02:29,990
Our constant companion,
these months, Mathilde and I.

1328
02:02:30,080 --> 02:02:34,270
Our love interwoven
with the love of Tristan and Isolde.

1329
02:02:35,880 --> 02:02:40,790
For the Emperor of Brazil, he asked for it.
He will build a theatre in Brazil.

1330
02:02:40,880 --> 02:02:46,000
Semper designs it.
I shall put Tristan and Isolde into it.

1331
02:03:02,480 --> 02:03:04,230
I am going blind.

1332
02:03:04,320 --> 02:03:06,830
Blind. Blind. Blind.

1333
02:03:09,680 --> 02:03:12,510
Blind. Blind. Agony.

1334
02:04:21,880 --> 02:04:23,670
Nothing to do with her.

1335
02:04:23,760 --> 02:04:27,270
The threads came together, that's all,
nothing at all to do with her,

1336
02:04:27,360 --> 02:04:29,990
nothing at all to do
with Mathilde Wesendonck.

1337
02:04:37,440 --> 02:04:40,070
- Yes?
- Another dog?

1338
02:04:40,160 --> 02:04:42,670
Yes, given us by Otto.

1339
02:04:59,360 --> 02:05:03,870
My dear fellow! My dear fellow,
how wonderful to see you.

1340
02:05:03,960 --> 02:05:06,550
How do you do?

1341
02:05:06,640 --> 02:05:09,870
More important than that. Can I introduce?

1342
02:05:09,960 --> 02:05:12,390
Dear Hans, you have been in Berlin.

1343
02:05:12,480 --> 02:05:16,550
How I envy you, you must tell us all.
Your work, how well does it go?

1344
02:05:16,640 --> 02:05:19,230
More important than that. Can I?

1345
02:05:19,320 --> 02:05:21,880
My dear Hans. Now we shall work.

1346
02:05:21,960 --> 02:05:27,110
- Did you abandon the law altogether?
- Can I introduce my bride?

1347
02:05:27,200 --> 02:05:30,150
- My bride.
- A honeymoon.

1348
02:05:30,240 --> 02:05:32,910
- They want to spend it with us.
- Where else?

1349
02:05:44,920 --> 02:05:47,510
- That piano!
- From Paris.

1350
02:05:47,600 --> 02:05:51,950
The only worthwhile object
to come out of that sink, that pit,

1351
02:05:52,040 --> 02:05:55,190
given to me by the widow Erard.

1352
02:05:55,280 --> 02:05:59,310
Frau Bülow, your husband plays
my rough drafts as if they were

1353
02:05:59,400 --> 02:06:03,470
already set down for the piano.
We shall make a lot of music.

1354
02:06:03,560 --> 02:06:06,020
- A lot.
- You'll be hungry.

1355
02:06:10,760 --> 02:06:14,350
Minna will see that you keep quiet
in the mornings.

1356
02:06:14,440 --> 02:06:16,820
Then in the afternoon
and the rest of the day,

1357
02:06:16,920 --> 02:06:21,590
we shall be with the Wesendoncks
and we'll make music together, all of us.

1358
02:06:24,120 --> 02:06:27,900
- All of us. I am so pleased to see you.
- Yes.

1359
02:06:28,000 --> 02:06:32,590
- What can I do? Copying? Anything?
- No, no.

1360
02:06:39,000 --> 02:06:42,190
How does The Ring come? Valkyrie?

1361
02:06:42,280 --> 02:06:49,860
That you should marry the daughter of Liszt,
it is splendidly round and come together.

1362
02:06:49,960 --> 02:06:54,980
There are times when things
do come together, have completeness.

1363
02:06:55,080 --> 02:06:58,950
I am so pleased, but then
you know that. Minna, feed them.

1364
02:07:14,040 --> 02:07:17,350
The light, the light.

1365
02:07:17,440 --> 02:07:24,510
Oh, this light.
How long before it was extinguished?

1366
02:07:24,600 --> 02:07:31,910
The sun had set, the day had died,
but its spite was unquenched.

1367
02:07:33,400 --> 02:07:39,790
It kindles the signal that holds me at bay
and sets it up by my beloved's door,

1368
02:07:41,760 --> 02:07:45,460
so that I may not make my way to her.

1369
02:08:18,800 --> 02:08:22,190
What are your feelings?

1370
02:08:23,880 --> 02:08:28,870
Mine are that I'm overwhelmed by the beauty
of the verse and the emotion.

1371
02:08:36,440 --> 02:08:38,390
I...

1372
02:10:42,760 --> 02:10:45,870
- Frau Wagner.
- Frau Wesendonck.

1373
02:10:47,480 --> 02:10:51,710
I have... I am here to tell you of my husband.

1374
02:10:53,040 --> 02:10:54,830
You are?

1375
02:10:54,920 --> 02:10:57,670
I've come to warn you
of the inevitable consequences

1376
02:10:57,760 --> 02:11:00,220
of your relationship with my husband.

1377
02:11:00,320 --> 02:11:04,670
Please. I would rather you did not.

1378
02:11:06,600 --> 02:11:11,620
I face separation from my husband,
a man I have lived with for 22 years.

1379
02:11:12,600 --> 02:11:14,870
I've been mistress of his household.

1380
02:11:14,960 --> 02:11:19,430
I am the person to whom
you should hold the utmost respect.

1381
02:11:21,160 --> 02:11:25,830
I am wife to once
the most respected composer in Germany,

1382
02:11:25,920 --> 02:11:29,110
who has in the past done wonderful things,

1383
02:11:29,200 --> 02:11:35,110
been Kapellmeister to the King of Saxony,
a position of some worth.

1384
02:11:37,520 --> 02:11:39,900
I have been beautiful.

1385
02:11:40,000 --> 02:11:41,510
Was ravishing.

1386
02:11:42,600 --> 02:11:45,910
Was worn down by his constant attention.

1387
02:11:46,720 --> 02:11:48,670
Only this made me marry him.

1388
02:11:49,760 --> 02:11:52,750
But I have had to support him for years.

1389
02:11:54,800 --> 02:11:59,270
I have been in the way
of becoming a very successful actress.

1390
02:11:59,360 --> 02:12:01,310
I gave it up.

1391
02:12:02,400 --> 02:12:07,070
Gave everything up to become
the wife of Richard Wagner.

1392
02:12:08,920 --> 02:12:11,630
You have not anything
you have given to him.

1393
02:12:13,080 --> 02:12:14,350
Nothing!

1394
02:12:16,280 --> 02:12:21,630
Frau Wagner, your husband treats
everything as his own, including my house.

1395
02:12:21,720 --> 02:12:24,990
Richard is in these things quite shameful.

1396
02:12:25,080 --> 02:12:29,190
No, no, I do believe
he does not even consider it.

1397
02:12:29,280 --> 02:12:32,430
Everything is put in the world for him to use.

1398
02:12:33,320 --> 02:12:37,630
He regards the denial of anything
he might consider necessary to him,

1399
02:12:37,720 --> 02:12:40,630
a house, money,

1400
02:12:40,720 --> 02:12:43,350
creature comforts, people.

1401
02:12:43,440 --> 02:12:48,870
He regards such denial as wicked,
quite simply wicked.

1402
02:12:50,880 --> 02:12:54,830
He calls to me and says this.

1403
02:12:56,640 --> 02:12:58,470
"Minna...

1404
02:12:59,560 --> 02:13:01,590
"We must separate.

1405
02:13:03,080 --> 02:13:09,510
"Frau Wesendonck who admires me,
with whom I am passionately in love...

1406
02:13:10,880 --> 02:13:14,150
"cannot stand our remaining together.

1407
02:13:15,120 --> 02:13:17,870
"She cannot stomach you,

1408
02:13:17,960 --> 02:13:20,470
"your sickliness,

1409
02:13:20,560 --> 02:13:23,230
"your lack of children,

1410
02:13:23,320 --> 02:13:24,870
"your barren womb. "

1411
02:13:24,960 --> 02:13:28,990
This is not touching on my state.

1412
02:13:29,080 --> 02:13:31,310
It is your vulgar letters,

1413
02:13:31,400 --> 02:13:33,510
the undermining of my position.

1414
02:13:34,560 --> 02:13:37,870
I am sick and ill
and cannot sleep unless I am...

1415
02:13:39,160 --> 02:13:41,540
If I were a common woman,

1416
02:13:42,480 --> 02:13:49,670
I would show your letters to that poor man,
your husband, that he might judge.

1417
02:13:54,320 --> 02:13:57,190
Then my husband can return to his work.

1418
02:13:59,080 --> 02:14:02,550
From which he has been kept
so shamefully!