I Puritani

About the Show

Richard Jones directs a new staging of Bellini’s last opera I puritani, featuring a sublime score and a passionate love story.

In a world of opposition, Elvira, a Puritan maiden, is in love with Arturo, a Royalist. Though her father initially opposes the match, he eventually agrees to their union. So far, so good – until their wedding day, when Arturo discovers that a Royalist prisoner needs help escaping and leaves Elvira, causing her to believe he has abandoned her for another woman. Heartbroken, she descends into madness. When Arturo, accused of treason, faces execution, the young couple's happiness is further threatened...

Vincenzo Bellini’s bel canto masterpiece is transformed in Richard Jones’ compelling new staging, which stars Lisette Oropesa as the devoted and deeply vulnerable heroine Elvira, and Francesco Demuro as her courageous lover. With virtuosic coloratura passages and ethereal, otherworldly arias, Bellini’s score imbues I puritani with profound emotional depth, the opera exploring, in equal parts, the tenderness of true love and the shattering anguish of loss. Conductor Riccardo Frizza makes his debut with The Royal Opera.

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