The Capture of Troy, Coliseum, London

Best of Berlioz is yet to come

When it comes to making a drama out of a crisis, Berlioz could learn a great deal from Richard Jones. Part One of English National Opera's riveting new staging of The Trojans – The Capture of Troy – has Jones, with customary brilliance, wit and insight, tying up and making capital of a few of the loose ends that Berlioz left undone. The Frenchman's imagination was extraordinary, the music innately theatrical, but he knew squat about writing a libretto.

What's with the American slang, you may ask? Well, you may also ask why the Trojan populace storming the Coliseum stage in the opening minutes of the opera are dressed like American tourists. Excited at the apparent departure of the aggressor Greeks from their land, they sing with unremitting gusto. Except that you can't make out a word. None of this is really the fault of the energetic ENO Chorus because Berlioz, in his first miscalculation of the work, packs all his information into choruses moving at the speed of a cruise missile. But Jones makes sure we get the message. After 10 years of incursions by the terrorist aggressor, this "great imperial nation" will rise again; there is a large chunk of passenger-jet fuselage lying smoking on the ground throughout the first act.

Jones, though, is careful to allude, never to spell out, and always includes an element of parody. Jingoism, masquerading as national security, is at the heart of The Capture of Troy.

Berlioz tells us nothing about the fallen leader Hector until Hector's ghost appears to send Aeneas to Italy. Jones, understanding the importance of his legacy to the opera, draws an uncomfortable parallel with a comparable icon of our age, JFK. In a victory rally, Hector's widow and son are honoured with "home movies" of a charismatic leader and loving father. The arrival of the Wooden Horse (to the strains of Berlioz's trite march) is like a Disney parade (designer Stewart Laing), grotesque caricatures of cowboys and Indians leading the procession, the former bearing a startling resemblance to an incumbent President. The point is, this nation will follow whosoever promises it "rightful" supremacy.

At the heart of the opera, and the only character to stand out much from the crowd, is Cassandra, the prophet of doom here depicted as one sorry woman on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Susan Bickley, hysterical in a sensible suit, gave it all she could, but ran slightly out of steam for her suicidal denoument. She and her sisters emerge from their bunker to the strains of strumming guitars ("We shall overcome") to make their final protest – irony of ironies – amidst a small forest of satellite discs. Chorebus (Robert Poulton), Cassandra's unfortunate husband, is reported dead (most of the really important events happen offstage in The Trojans); but Aeneas (John Daszak), bloodied but unbowed (a scary image, courtesy of Jones not Berlioz), lives to fight another day. (In May, actually, when Part Two,The Trojans at Carthage will be unveiled).

Daszak's Aeneas will have more to get his teeth into then. As will the conductor, Paul Daniel. No question that Berlioz's best music is to come. Meanwhile, to the gentleman on my left who shouted "rubbish" at the final curtain, I say that there is no more thoughtful or exciting director working in opera today than Richard Jones.

To 27 February (020-7632 8300)