Billy Budd review – Clayton’s Vere is the devastating heart of vivid staging

Glyndebourne, Sussex This revival of Michael Grandage’s atmospheric production of Britten’s opera has numerous fine performances: Thomas Mole and Sam Carl are persuasive as Billy and Claggart, and Allan Clayton’s luminous Vere is a standout Brutalist grey, its deck gently curved, HMS Indomitable looms over Michael Grandage ’s production of Britten’s Billy Budd . Half-skeleton, half-cage, the ship is relentlessly claustrophobic, its hard edges softened only by coils of rope, hammocks and Paule Constable ’s subtle, painterly lighting. No wonder the opera’s crowd of male bodies – clad here in spo

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