La Scala Opera Series

Date: Friday, July 18, 7:30pm
Tickets: $20
Location: Mountain Cinema in the Doctorow Center for the Arts, Rte. 23A, Village of Hunter, NY
Reservations: 518-263-2002

by Gaetano Donizetti
Directed, Designed & Costumed by Pier Luigi Pizzi
Conducted by Antonino Fogliani

Maria Stuarda (Mary Stuart) is a tragic opera based on Friedrich von Schiller's 1800 play Maria Stuart. It received its premiere on December 30, 1835 at La Scala and is based on the lives of Mary, Queen of Scots and her cousin Queen Elizabeth I. During the negotiations of a marriage proposal between Queen Elizabeth and the King of France, Lord Talbot, intercedes on behalf of the royal prisoner Maria Stuart, imprisoned in Fotheringay Castle since fleeing from Scotland. The Queen is torn between sympathy for Maria and fear that she is plotting against her, but her wrath comes from Leicester, the man she loves, who argues her rivals' case with a passion that makes her feel betrayed. As the queens confront one another, each is already convinced that the other is haughty, yet the final triumph proves elusive to either one.