Behind the passionate, love-at-first sight tale of “Troilus and Cressida” is a story about war weariness, war’s futility and the painful cost to losers and winners.

This St. Louis production is more than a revival of a fine work; it’s the world premiere of a new performing version.

Right after World War II, BBC Radio commissioned the already renowned British composer William Walton to write his first opera. He turned to English literature and pulled out a poetic masterpiece by the father of English literature Geoffrey Chaucer: “Troilus and Cressida.” Walton and his librettist Christopher Hassall added a dash of bitters from Shakespeare’s play of the same name to Chaucer’s plot.  

As Walton and Hassall set their story, emotions are raw. The Trojan War is 10 years old. Both Trojans and Greeks long to end the war. Troy’s high priest Calkas says enough war is enough and calls for Troy’s surrender.

Striding on the stage in full voice are

• a pandering comic uncle,
• a Greek father who puts his ambition before his daughter’s heart,
• a religious leader who betrays those who follow him,
• and a beautiful, abandoned young widow who is convinced that she is alone, powerless and destined to become homeless.

Adding to the heartbreak are intercepted love letters and a signal from a red scarf, once a love token.

The opera’s world premiere -- Dec. 3, 1954 at London’s Royal Opera House, Covent Garden -- was before an audience who understood war weariness. To arrive at the opera house, many would have passed destruction created by Nazi bombings. Its Luftwaffe had destroyed Walton’s London home in May 1941.

In February 1947, when BBC Radio commissioned Walton, the story’s themes were closer to the hearts of the British. His work on it was slow and was interrupted when he was asked to write two pieces for the 1953 coronation of Queen Elizabeth II,  including the march “Orb and Sceptre.”

By the time of the opera’s premiere, five years after he had picked the plot, the British had opened a window on the future under their new young queen. Artists called for a New Elizabethan Age. Hope abounded. Perhaps the audience had had enough love-torn war stories. Reviews were kind but not convincing. 

In 1967, British stage director and opera librettist Colin Graham directed Walton’s only other opera, “The Bear.” So, when Covent Garden revived “Troilus” in 1967, it turned to Graham to direct it. The music for the role of Cressida was reworked from a soprano voice to a mezzo-soprano, so the great British mezzo Janet Baker could sing the role. The audience warmly applauded the composer, by then knighted, Sir William Walton, and critics gave the opera fine reviews.

Graham, the catalyst who gave the opera new life, was longtime Opera Theatre of St. Louis artistic director. He was a friend of Walton and his widow and a champion of Walton’s music. For many years, Graham spend part of each summer at the Waltons’ home on the island of Ischia, eight miles off of the Italian coast southwest of the Bay of Naples.

Art from OTSL

In the 1990s Graham had helped the Walton Foundation and the Oxford University Press (funds were also donated by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, the Rudolph W. Driscoll Endowment for Contemporary Opera and Emily Rauh Pulitzer) commission composer John Gibbons to make a revised orchestration of “Troilus.” 

The revision was aided by an extraordinary collection of eight bound volumes of letters between Walton and his librettist Hassall. This pair did not lean over the same piano putting word and notes together. Rather, they collaborated mostly by mail, leaving a remarkable record of their ideas on everything from Chaucer’s Middle English words, to Puccini and Verdi’s inspiring Italian romantic operas to aria’s ideal lengths.

A couple of years ago, Graham began preparing the OTSL production, which he passionately hoped would finally do justice to Walton’s romantic classically based music.

His convictions about the opera became a legacy. Graham died at the age of 75 on April 6, 2007. OTSL general director Charles McKay, his staff and cast are dedicating this production to Colin Graham’s memory.

British-born Stephen Lawless directs, Australian Antony Walker conducts and Brit Gideon Davey designed the sets. Lawless and Davey hope to take the audience back to the years just before Walton was composing the work. The setting of ancient Troy aims to evoke the claustrophobia of WW II Brits seeking protection from the Nazi Blitz in the depths of the London Underground, Lawless said. 

All involved in the production hope the opera will  prove that a classic story can universally reach out to 21st century audiences.

The apparent tale that led to this story was written in the 12th century by French medieval writer Benoit de Saint Maure. The Frenchman borrowed Homer’s name for the Trojan prince Troilus and called a young Greek woman Briseida. In the early 14th century, Italian Renaissance poet Giovanni Boccaccio enhanced Saint Maure’s tale and called the young Greek widow Cressida. In the late 14th century, the well-traveled English diplomat and writer Chaucer deftly reworked the Italian’s story. Then, in mid-20th century Walton and librettist Hassall mostly bypassed  Shakespeare’s 16th century version of the couple and reached back to Chaucer.

Now, in St. Louis, a team of 21st century artists creatively try to make its tale and often shimmering music in its new revised orchestration relevant for our times.