Royal Opera indulges directors and egos | Letters

In his review of Lucia di Lammermoor at the Royal Opera House (9 April) Tim Ashley doesn’t appear to have heard the laughter that accompanied Lucia and Alisa’s increasingly desperate, and barely competent, efforts to murder the bound and blindfolded (don’t ask) Arturo. It is quite an achievement to reduce the audience to almost helpless laughter in one of opera’s iconic tragic masterpieces. As for the much-trailed sex scene, two world-class singers bouncing around in time