The Score, a British production directed by the well-regarded director Trevor Nunn, and now playing at D.C.'s Shakespeare Theatre Company, is based on a real-life event from the 18th century. Johann Sebastian Bach journeyed from his home city of Leipzig, where he was chorusmaster, organist, and composer, in response to the invitation to visit the King of Prussia,, Frederick the Great, at his palace in Potsdam.
Bach is aging, doesn't want to make the arduous trip, and disapproves of Frederick because of his war-making and the deaths his battles have caused to civilians in Silesia and in Leipzig, where other atrocities were committed by Frederic's Prussian army. The play tried out in Bath and then was presented in the West End, London. This is its only American booking.
Brian Cox, a star of the English stage, plays Bach and is definitely the leading character. Nicole Ansari-Cox, his wife in real life, plays his wife in the play, and Stephen Hagan plays Frederick. The play's first act is a (slow) set-up to what happens in Potsdam and Bach's faith-based beliefs against Prussian militarism are more than adequately advanced by Cox in scenes with his wife and his son, Carl (better known as the classical composer C.P.E. Bach), who is working as a composer for Frederick.
The action and drama arrive in the significantly longer second act when Bach arrives at Frederick's palace. Their differences focused on faith and war--it's not too hard to figure out who's in favor of which--emerge despite the senior Bach's promise to his son to restrict his touching on these touchy subjects. The other court composers suggest to Frederick that a theme he has composed--Frederick enjoys his slight efforts to compose--be the subject of a wager as to whether J.S. Bach can compose a three-part fugue from the short theme.
J.S. proceeds to do just what is asked, surprising all of them, except his son, who wins the bet. The elder Bach is totally unaware that the request Frederick makes for him to compose the fugue is the subject of the wager and was intended to demonstrate Bach's declining powers in performing what the composers deemed an impossible task. His performing what would be impossible for any other composer confirms the assertion Carl has made (and wagered) that his father remains the greatest musician then extant in Europe.
The tension of the drama is whether Bach's angry argument of his views on faith and war will cause Frederick to take action against him, given the powers of royalty and the atmosphere of suspicion and accusation in the palace, especially in Prussia, in those days. But it does not come to that. In fact, the closing scene finds Frederick visiting Bach at his Leipzig home where they continue their discussion. The presence of Voltaire, well played by Peter de Jersey, injects some needed lightness and even a bit of humor to the proceedings.
The play by Oliver Cotton does well in presenting the verbal and intellectual conflict. In London and Bath, Cox, who played the leading character, Logan Roy, in the streaming drama Succession, received strong reviews for his performance. In my view, I was more impressed by how Hagan created the character of Frederick the Great. The King was known for inviting major artistic figures in Europe to visit him as despite his basic orientation as a warrior king, has major intellectual and artistic ambitions. Thus the presence of Voltaire as a visitor when J.S. Bach was also spending what turns out to be only two days at Potsdam.
In Hagan's depiction, Frederick's positions are presented shrewdly and effectively, with a good deal of charm. Cox makes Bach a powerful force but given the atmosphere of suspicion and suppression in the King's court, to me he came off as too strong and too loud. Bach at one point recalls how in Leipzig he needed to negotiate with the city councillors for his wages and working conditions; he admits that he hasn't succeeded in winning what he feels he deserves. Underneath, Bach likely accepts that he is unlikely to convert Frederick but his continued assertion of his views in a challenging tone made me feel that he was deciding in his old age to say things that he had not dared to say earlier.
The subservient attitude of the three court composers, who are in awe of J.S. Bach, as well as the same outlook of Bach's son, who urges him not to remonstrate with Carl's employer, Frederick, conveys the scary atmosphere of the palace. I had the feeling that the playwright was striving to show that J.S. Bach was by this time (62 was doubtless an advanced age then) beyond suppressing his opinions to anyone's control, even a monarch who may have had stronger intellectual powers but probably the tempestuousness of Henry VIII.
All in all, it was a good theatrical experience. The play will be playing for another month in D.C. with, as noted above, no present plans to put it on elsewhere in the U.S.
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