Adriana Lecouvreur

Directed by David McVicar and François Roussillon

With Jonas Kaufmann, Angela Gheorghiu, Olga Borodina, Alessandro Corbelli and Iain Paton

Starring Angela Gheorghiu as the celebrated French actress Adriana Lecouvreur and Jonas Kaufmann as her lover Maurizio, Count of Saxony, Cilea s verismo drama explores celebrity, romance, jealousy, and death. The trio of sublime voices is completed by Russian mezzo-soprano Olga Borodina as Adriana s jealous rival, the Princess de Bouillon. David McVicar s hit production the first performance of the opera at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden for more than a century presents the life of the French actress as a blurring of the distinction between fantasy and reality. The action revolves around a life-size Baroque Theatre, taking us from the bustle and colour of the first act backstage at the playhouse, to the bare final scenes as the drama reaches its fatal climax.