The Royal Ballet: Mayerling, London, April/May 2017

[Johnpw]

2 hours ago, Fiz said:

Lin, BBB is right. After Rudolf's death, Franz Josef's nephew Franz Ferdinand was the heir presumptive. He was fairly shy and suffered from T.B. Neither Elizabeth nor the Emperor liked him and cold shouldered him. Their dislike of him deepened as he was pro more inclusivity of the different states that Austria governed. After his marriage to the noble but non royal Countess Sophie Chotek, it was obvious that their children would not inherit the throne as their parents' married morganatically. Therefore Franz Josef totally ignored him. Franz Ferdinand did not want to become emperor but the murder of an Austrian heir to the throne was made a casus belli with Serbia and led to the chain of alliances coming into play which triggered debacle of WWI.

By coincidence, Sophie von Chotek's father (Count Bohuslav Chotek) was Austrian Ambassador in Brussels at the time Stephanie was identified as a possible bride for Rudolf and was there throughout the "courtship", such as it was,  the "asking for the hand" and the arrangements for the wedding.

 

While based on historical sources and dealing with "real" people, we need to remember that Gillian Freeman, who wrote the scenario, was a novelist and screenwriter, not a historian. Kenneth McMillan was capable, I think, of wanting to make a dark story even darker. There are suspect emphases and improbabilities in what we see on stage even if, as stage drama, it all has a powerful effect.

Just a couple of examples.....

Archduchess Sophie (mother of Franz Josef and Elisabeth's formidable mother-in-law) died in 1872 and could not have been present at either the wedding or the Emperor's birthday party. Nonetheless Ursula Hageli provides a good characterisation so I suppose her "symbolic presence" as an "influence" might be justified.

The literature suggests that Rudolf had a curiosity about death even as a child which became more morbid as he grew older but, generally, the skull on the desk is thought to make an appearance, via a professor of anatomy, in the two years before Mayerling - not at the time of the wedding. In fact I've never read in any reputable source that Rudolf frightened Stephanie with a revolver on their wedding night (I wonder what the source of that is). On the other hand, Mary's reaction to skull and revolver is documented.

The Vetseras were members of the so-called "Second Society" (minor nobility and "new money"). Only members of the "First Society" (the higher aristocracy) with the necessary 16 quarterings of nobility had access to the Court. It's so unlikely as to be impossible that Baroness Vetsera and the young Mary should be at something as prestigious as the Crown Prince's wedding ball. Symbolically it might, I suppose, suggest Mary's early obsession with Rudolf - it was that way round, she made the running initially (without knowing what was in store).

And so on.

In McMillan's portrait of Rudolf we can get no sense of why, for example, he was such a favourite of Queen Victoria. She conferred the Order of the Garter on him  - rather unusually as he wasn't a reigning monarch - and he himself reported that she tickled him while doing so. Victoria had one of the best news and "gossip" networks in Europe through her diplomats and large extended family. She'd have known about it if he were merely a "monster of depravity". Instead, even after Mayerling, she was still writing about the "poor dear Crown Prince". 

In the period covered by the ballet, he was the great hope of the beleaguered Austrian Liberals (in the 19th century, not modern American, sense of the word). He was also close to that serious and high-minded royal couple, the short-reigned Emperor Friedrich of Germany and his wife, Queen Victoria's eldest daughter. We get no sense of any of this, just of a man in a state of breakdown for 8 whole years! It's that which interested McMillan.

Because of family background in two of the countries formerly ruled by the Habsburgs, I've long taken an interest in the history of that part of Europe which, inevitably, includes Habsburg family history. This run is the first time I've seen Mayerling and I've now seen it several times. Some background knowledge is indeed useful to know who people are and how they relate, but I find that I also have to put what I know to one side to make sense of what I'm seeing on stage.

 

  

[bangorballetboy]

35 minutes ago, Two Pigeons said:

I have often wondered what happened to Mitzi Caster,  not least as I believe Rudolf willed her all  his possessions.  I have been unsuccessful in this but if anyone can enlighten me I would be very appreciative.

 

I don't think that's correct.  Rudolf's daughter was the main beneficiary of his will with some legacies made to members of the household and staff.

[MAB]

2 hours ago, Ivy Lin said:

 

Ludwig was designated "mad" not just because he was unworldly but because he was gay. A sad life and actually, one that could make a good ballet if ballet goers are willing to confront some very painful, uncomfortable issues.

 

Even in the nineteenth century being gay wasn't a barrier to being a ruler.  Ludwig II was declared mad by his relatives concerned about the family fortune dwindling away because of Ludwig's addiction to fantasy building projects.  Agree a cracking ballet could be made of his life.  Elizabeth was his favourite cousin, they were very close and he was briefly engaged to one of her sisters, Sadly John Lanchbury is no longer around to orchestrate the Wagner, but I've always considered Tannhauser a score that would be very danceable

[bangorballetboy]

38 minutes ago, Two Pigeons said:

I have often wondered what happened to Mitzi Caster,  not least as I believe Rudolf willed her all  his possessions.  I have been unsuccessful in this but if anyone can enlighten me I would be very appreciative.

 

Thought, of course, Rudolf had already given her a three storey house and plenty of money...

[Fiz]

Oops! Yes, Sim. Silly me. ?

[Ivy Lin]

There was also speculation that Mary might have been pregnant with Rudolf's baby, which might have increased the desperation to die with Rudolf. She was as I said only 17. I was also surprised to see a real-life picture of her because in the ballets she's always been played by very kittenish, sexy ballerinas. In real life she was somewhat homely. I think of her as a victim too and if I have a problem with MacMillan's characterization it's that Mary is often seen as this very sexually aggressive femme fatale. 

 

[Johnpw]

30 minutes ago, David said:

 

I so agree - particularly in his use of the Faust Symphony in the final stages. Liszt was a contemporary of and knew the Empress Elizabeth - in fact I'm sure I read somewhere he wrote a piece for her? I've been meaning to check if it was the song that the actress Katharina Schratt sings in the ballet but haven't got round to it. Does anybody know please?

 

 

I believe the piece he wrote for an album for the Empress Elisabeth was a "Berceuse" for piano. A quick listen on youtube to the Berceuse S.174 reminds me of the music for the Rudolf/Elisabeth scene, but I'm now so used to an orchestrated version I may be wrong.

[David]

Thank you Johnpw. I'll certainly check that out.

Edited May 8, 2017 by David

[Jane S]

39 minutes ago, MAB said:

 

... but I've always considered Tannhauser a score that would be very danceable

 

LIke this?

[Johnpw]

1 hour ago, Two Pigeons said:

I have often wondered what happened to Mitzi Caster,  not least as I believe Rudolf willed her all  his possessions.  I have been unsuccessful in this but if anyone can enlighten me I would be very appreciative.

 

There's a wikipedia entry on Mizzi (or Mitzi) Kaspar which gives brief details including that she died aged 42 in 1907. As BBB has already mentioned, Rudolf didn't leave her everything

However, it is true that, at Mayerling, he left a letter for his literary executor, Count Szögyeny, instructing him to go to his desk at the Hofburg where he was to destroy certain letters, deliver others (including those to his wife and Mitzi) and to give Mitzi any money found in the drawer. The contents of the letter to Mitzi aren't known but it's said to have been "overflowing with love" (Count Hoyos, reporting hints from Szögyeny). He had spent his last night in Vienna with Mitzi (according to police reports).

[David]

49 minutes ago, Ivy Lin said:

There was also speculation that Mary might have been pregnant with Rudolf's baby, which might have increased the desperation to die with Rudolf.

Speculation has been rife regarding the 13th Jan 1889, the date that she underlined in red in her diary. Gerd Holler, a doctor, a Mayerling enthusiast and key proponent of the pregnancy theory, was convinced that it was the day on which her pregnancy was confirmed. Fifteen days later, Mary and Rudolf went to Mayerling. Two days later they were both dead.

 

Holler believed that her death was due to a failed abortion leading to a haemorrhage which could not be stemmed, followed by Rudolph’s suicide – just one of countless hypotheses, boosted by unsubstantiated reports/rumours of attendances by midwives on 28^th Jan and 29^th Jan, according to Holler’s theory to insert and, 24hrs later to remove a catheter in the uterus.

 

There is nothing in her recently published letters to her family to support all this and that particular speculation seems pretty much discredited, along with theories of political assassination and so on. 

 

[CHazell2]

Hi Johnpw. Thanks for all the historical information on here - very fascinating and as a fellow historian I salute you. Please can you tell us more about Mary Vetsera and her family - they seem to be a fascinating family?

 

Was Mary Vetsera really a femme fatale or just a young girl who bit off more than she could chew?

[David]

10 minutes ago, Johnpw said:

 He had spent his last night in Vienna with Mitzi (according to police reports).

 

And according to Stephanie, his wife! She would later record contemptuously: “Who was Mary Vetsera? One of many! He spent his last night with his friend, Vienna’s Grande Cocotte.” - by whom she meant Mizzy with whom she claimed he had spent the night before travelling to Mayerling.

[Fiz]

One final piece of information about Vienna in the 1880s and 1890s is that the city had a very high teenage suicide rate. It was almost as if it was fashionable. Two good books about this and Mayerling are "A Nervous Splendour" (Vienna) and "The Road to Mayerling". I'm sorry but I can't remember the authors but Amazon will find them through the titles.

[CHazell2]

15 minutes ago, Fiz said:

One final piece of information about Vienna in the 1880s and 1890s is that the city had a very high teenage suicide rate. It was almost as if it was fashionable.

That's really interesting - I didn't know that. So Mary was just following the current fashion as it were?

 

Sorry, I didn't mean to be flippant. Why was there such a high rate of teenage suicide?

Edited May 8, 2017 by CHazell2

[Johnpw]

21 minutes ago, Fiz said:

One final piece of information about Vienna in the 1880s and 1890s is that the city had a very high teenage suicide rate. It was almost as if it was fashionable. Two good books about this and Mayerling are "A Nervous Splendour" (Vienna) and "The Road to Mayerling". I'm sorry but I can't remember the authors but Amazon will find them through the titles.

Yes, worth reading.

"A Nervous Splendour" is by Frederic Morton (and casts its net much wider than Mayerling).  

"The Road to Mayerling" is by Richard Barkeley. I believe Mr Barkeley had an Austrian Jewish background (the birth name was Baumgarten). This is relevant in view of the dedication of his book "To the memory of my father a lifelong Liberal....." I suspect the family background was precisely that Jewish middle-class which had hopes of the Crown Prince, a known opponent of the growing anti-semitism of the German national parties. Mr Barkeley doesn't hide his admiration for Rudolf's politics which may (possibly) lead him to downplay the reports of "depravity". However, his book is a useful counter-weight to all those other sources (McMillans?) in which Rudolf is nothing but a drug-addicted, syphilitic, womaniser.

Both books have some information on the Vetsera family. As does "Clash of Generations" by Lavender Cassels which looks at Rudolf in some detail as well as his cousin the Archduke Johann Salvator (who features in some of the more far-fetched conspiracy theories around Mayerling and who eventually resigned his position as an Archduke).

[alison]

Barring the odd digression (ahem!), this thread has been fascinating and highly informative.  I'd like to thank all those who've contributed to increasing our knowledge about the real history of the events.  And I'm even sadder that I've only seen what is likely to be my one and only performance in this run

[Fiz]

CH2, I'm not sure. It was almost as if it was the zeitgeist. Morton quotes numerous teenage girls' diaries and they mention that this friend has committed suicide or is seriously considering doing so or that friend has T.B. and will probably be dead soon. The Romantic movement of the 1830s and 1840s had seemed almost to be in love with young death, perhaps a reaction to the sheer amount of deaths from T.B. Even in the 1880s, Vienna had a higher toll from it than any other European capital. Perhaps it was just a continuation?

Edited May 8, 2017 by Fiz
Omitted word.

[Jan McNulty]

IIRC there was a concern about a town in Wales a few years ago because there was a high incidence of teenage boys committing suicides.

[Fiz]

I remember, Jan. 

[Lizbie1]

And a century previously the publication of Werther led to a suicide craze, or at least that's the story: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Sorrows_of_Young_Werther#Cultural_impact

[Geoff]

7 hours ago, MAB said:

the dancer Lola Montez.  Lola also counted amongst her lovers Franz Liszt and Marius Petipa, perhaps a subject for a ballet in her own right one day.

 

She has of course already been the subject of one of the most gorgeous and stylish films of all time, Lola Montès, the last work of the (I hope not entirely forgotten) genius director Max Ophüls. 

[Geoff]

2 hours ago, Johnpw said:

"A Nervous Splendour" is by Frederic Morton (and casts its net much wider than Mayerling).  

"The Road to Mayerling" is by Richard Barkeley.

 

Both are highly readable but not wholly reliable. For safer historiography I tend to favour the work of the Gernan-Austrian Brigitte Hamann, who sadly died last year. Probably best known in Britain for her ground-breaking "Hitler's Vienna", she also wrote widely on the Habsburgs, including books translated into English on Sissi and Rudolf.

[CHazell2]

I wish that I had learnt German at school - as Birgitte Hamann is very hard to find in English.

[Geoff]

57 minutes ago, CHazell2 said:

I wish that I had learnt German at school - as Birgitte Hamann is very hard to find in English.

 

Not all of them:-

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=sr_nr_p_n_feature_browse-b_0?fst=as%3Aoff&rh=n%3A266239%2Ck%3ABrigitte+Hamann%2Cp_n_feature_browse-bin%3A400530011&keywords=Brigitte+Hamann&ie=UTF8&qid=1494280471&rnid=400529011

 

[Ivy Lin]

I love finding real life pictures of the people in the Mayerling drama.

Here's Empress Elisabeth.

 

Obviously a very beautiful woman. Empress Elisabeth would have been considered anorexic today, as she was fanatical about maintaining her weight. She also was traumatized by having three children in as many years and abhorred sex. 

[Fiz]

Oh gosh, thank you, Geoff! I've wanted this book for so long. My husband will not be pleased but too bad. ?

[penelopesimpson]

Just wanted to say what a wonderful thread this has been.  I have learnt so much, having always been intrigued by Mayerling.  Once again demonstrating the wealth of knowlege possessed by members of this forum.

[Fiz]

So my husband just rolled his eyes when I told him. His patience and forebearance are just two of the reasons I love him. And now, back to Mayerling!

[Johnpw]

10 hours ago, Ivy Lin said:

I love finding real life pictures of the people in the Mayerling drama.

Here's Empress Elisabeth.

 

Obviously a very beautiful woman. Empress Elisabeth would have been considered anorexic today, as she was fanatical about maintaining her weight. She also was traumatized by having three children in as many years and abhorred sex. 

I've puzzled over this photo as it's not one I recognise of the Empress (who was young in the 1850s) -  the hair style and colouring don't seem quite right. Professor Google throws up the same image as Archduchess Elisabeth, daughter of Rudolf and Stephanie (in a postcard version the words "Erzherzogin Elisabeth" appear in the bottom corner). If that is the case, thanks for letting us see a picture of "the poor little one, all that remains of me" as Rudolf calls her in his last letter to his wife. Her upbringing can't have been easy, to say the least.

[penelopesimpson]

3 minutes ago, Johnpw said:

I've puzzled over this photo as it's not one I recognise of the Empress (who was young in the 1850s) -  the hair style and colouring don't seem quite right. Professor Google throws up the same image as Archduchess Elisabeth, daughter of Rudolf and Stephanie (in a postcard version the words "Erzherzogin Elisabeth" appear in the bottom corner). If that is the case, thanks for letting us see a picture of "the poor little one, all that remains of me" as Rudolf calls her in his last letter to his wife. Her upbringing can't have been easy, to say the least.

Do you know what happened to her?

[MAB]

This Wiki entry has some information.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archduchess_Elisabeth_Marie_of_Austria

[BMC]

Does anyone remember the ballet Sissi with Sylvie Guillem? Just looked it up and it was in 1993 at Sadlers Wells. I remember going to see it but very little else, apart from the man behind me saying'how does she do that?' when she did her 6 o'clock position and some lovely costumes. Any memory jogging much appreciated!!