Carmen- Royal Ballet and Opera

Carmen- Royal Ballet and Opera description

Carmen, Georges Bizet's incandescent opera of desire and defiance, takes the Royal Opera House stage in a new production by director Damiano Michieletto. At its heart is one of opera's most vivid and irreducible heroines: the gypsy Carmen, who refuses to belong to anyone, whose freedom is both her most seductive quality and the source of her tragedy. The story of how her relationship with the soldier Don José spirals from infatuation to obsession to violence is told by Bizet — and by librettists Meilhac and Halévy, drawing on Prosper Mérimée's novella — with a dramatic directness that makes the opera feel perpetually, dangerously alive.

Damiano Michieletto, one of Italy's most acclaimed opera directors and a regular presence at the world's leading houses, brings his characteristic blend of theatrical intelligence and psychological insight to a score that encompasses the unforgettable Habanera, the soaring Flower Song, and an ending of raw, brutal inevitability. Works as beloved and as widely performed as Carmen can easily be taken for granted — but in the right hands, in the right house, they reveal themselves anew. This is such an occasion.

Playing at Royal Opera House (venue info)

Performance Times for Carmen- Royal Ballet and Opera