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Disclaimer:  I never read what the director says is supposed to be going on in the production.  I like it to unfold while I am watching and listening.  I want to allow for the possibility of surprise.  I assume that whatever I am seeing is what is intended for me to see.  If I have to read things to understand the production, something is wrong.  The purpose of the production is to explain the opera to me. I consider it the director's responsibility to communicate to me what the production means by putting the meaning in the production.

Now that it's over, I have read a lot of commentary about what was supposed to be going on in Faust.  Perhaps they were confused and I was not because they read the director's explanation.

I want to know what in the visual elements of this production would have led one to believe this was another Doctor Atomic, and that he sold his soul, not for a young woman as seems so obvious, but for the atomic bomb?  I read that that's what this production was supposed to mean.  I do not read what besides the fact that they all wore lab coats would have meant that?  I insist that if you can't see it, easily and clearly see it, it isn't there.

I don't memorize leitmotivs or tone rows either.