Not Quite Q.E.D., But Ominous Nevertheless

[Note: This post has been updated (3) as of 7:25 PM Eastern on 25 Jul. See below.]

In a 19 July S&F entry questioning the current outside-Germany relevance and importance of the Bayreuther Festspiele, we suggested that venerable institution, the oldest music festival extant today, had in fact outlived its outside-Germany relevance and importance due the 44-year cumulative artistic damage, both musical and theatrical, that's been done to the Festspiele under the general directorship of recently deceased Wagner grandson Wolfgang Wagner, and suggested three requirements the fulfillment of which would be necessary for the Festspiele to regain its famed pre-war artistic excellence and glory. One of those suggested requirements was,

[T]he jettisoning and firm disavowal of Eurotrash Regietheater stagings which today and for several decades now have disgraced the Festspiele's stage and everything the Festspiele stands for — or, rather, should stand for — according to the imperatives of the Festspiele's founding genius, Richard Wagner.

We were not sanguine about the possibility of the demands of that requirement ever being met under the new co-directorship of the Festspiele of Wagner half-sisters Katharina Wagner and Eva Wagner-Pasquier, declaring that both sisters,

...are not only little inclined to satisfy the demands of that...requirement, but seem intransigently committed to flying in the face of that requirement, as was their father [Wolfgang Wagner] before them, in the false and perverse belief that it is just such stagings that will guarantee the future outside-Germany relevance and importance of the Festspiele.

We now learn from this Guardian article that, "Katharina Wagner has let slip [that] rats will be let loose on a set designed to resemble an animal research laboratory" in the Festspiele's new staging of Lohengrin, the Festspiele's only new staging this year.

Not quite Q.E.D. as this clearly Eurotrash Regietheater staging was given a green light while Wolfgang was still general director of the Festspiele and there was little the sisters could have done to alter it even had they wanted to, but it's an ominous sign nevertheless.

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Update (9:12 PM Eastern on 24 Jul): Intermezzo has photos.

Update 2 (6:01 PM Eastern on 25 Jul): More pics from Opera Chic

Update 3 (7:25 PM Eastern on 25 Jul): And here are 12 more pics.