Mahler (1974)

David Collings: Hugo Wolfe

Photos 

Quotes 

• Gustav Mahler : Last year I was selected from many applicants to conduct a season of German music at the Royal Opera House in London. Where I performed with some success the works of Richard Wagner.

  Hugo Wolfe : Wagner? That there's the rub.

  Gustav Mahler : I beg your pardon, Your Majesty?

  Hugo Wolfe : Drop your trousers! I'm sure your wife won't object. I assume she's seen it before.

  [Gustav drops his trousers, the Hugo inspects] 

  Hugo Wolfe : It's as I thought. A Jew! There's the rub. We have some brilliant surgeons here, they could probably graft on a new foreskin, but - but I doubt you could deceive Cosima Wagner. She can smell a Jew a mile off and she's an even greater anti-Semite than her late belated husband. Unless we can win her over, my hands are tied. I rule the country, but she rules the world - of music.