An operatic debut for a devilish tale
TOMORROW may well be Scottish Opera’s most exciting night of the year. The company is presenting not only a world premiere, rare enough these days, but one inspired by one of Scotland’s greatest ever writers. The Devil Inside has been adapted from Robert Louis Stevenson’s short story The Bottle Imp. But just to ramp up the ante, it has been adapted by award-winning Scots novelist Louise Welsh and Inverness-born composer Stuart MacRae.
The Bottle Imp is an unsettling story of the supernatural set in l ate 19th century Polynesia, in which protagonist Keawe buys a bottle with a ‘devil’ inside which has the power to grant any wish the owner desires.
There is, of course, a catch. The bottle is cursed. If the owner dies with it still in his possession, his soul will be damned to rot in Hell for all eternity. But the bottle cannot be thrown or given away – and it must be sold at less than the price the holder paid for it.
As the price drops, the harder the bottle becomes to sell. As you might imagine, the crux of the story comes when the price has become very low indeed.
This is not the first time MacRae and Welsh have produced a collaboration for Scottish Opera. They were responsible for 2012’s South Bank Sky Arts award-winner Ghost Patrol. But this production seems to have the potential to be even more special,
Only days before the world premiere at Glasgow’s Theatre Royal, I spoke to Welsh, who won the Crime Writers’ Association Creasey Dagger award for a best first crime novel for The Cutting Room in 2003.
I asked her whose idea it had been to adapt Stevenson’s story for the operatic stage – and her reply was straight to the point.
‘It was my idea. I first read The Bottle Imp as a wee girl. I loved it and I’ve read it many times since. Then one day I thought it would be good for an opera. I swapped emails with Stuart and he agreed.
It has everything an opera needs; a great central premise, structure, allegory. We’ve made it into a 21st century allegory, in a contemporary setting in the West. While working on it, Stuart and I must have met up about 30 times – some brief, some for hours on end. When you work like that, you get to know a person very well. But you have to look at everything through the filter of the opera.’
For a novelist used to writing original works of fiction, how different, or even difficult, is it to adapt someone else’s work, particularly someone like Robert Louis Stevenson?
She said: ‘It’s quite a privilege. It’s interesting in that it’s originally a folk story. There’s a version by the Brothers Grimm. So Stevenson adapted it himself, in a sense. But if you are adapting something, you have to take own- ership. We did change specific things. We moved away from the original in quite a few respects.
‘After all, it does say in the programme “inspired by Robert Louis Stevenson”. We owe him a massive debt but we’ve made something else of the story, just as he did.’
Traditionally, of course, an opera’s librettist has always played second fiddle, as it were, to the composer. So what does a leading contemporary novelist think of that? You might be surprised. Welsh said: ‘Absolutely. The composer is king. I keep saying that to Stuart and he always makes a funny face. But it’s true, the composer is king.
‘When you’re writing a novel, your name’s on the front cover, in big letters. But this is a casting off of ego. It’s a true collaboration between the librettist, the composer, the director and so many other people. I loved it; I really, loved it. It is such a joy to walk into the room and see the whole team with a smile on their face.’
On the question of her alterations to Stevenson’s version, I had to ask Welsh if she had changed the ending. Her reply? ‘You’ll have to wait for the opera on Saturday night.’ Quite so.
Following tomorrow’s world premiere in Glasgow, The Devil Inside will be touring to Edinburgh, England, Wales and Canada.