Following a successful summer season of The Barber of Seville, opera’s most charming and mischievous character Figaro returns to the Sydney Opera House this week in Mozart’s delightful comedy, The Marriage of Figaro.
This “comic cauldron of sex and social politics” (Limelight) picks up several years from its prequel. The formerly young and romantic Count Almaviva is now a womaniser obsessed with his servant, and Figaro’s fiancé, Susanna, much to the annoyance of Rosina, the now countess, while Dr Bartolo is still hungry for revenge against Figaro for intervening in his plans to marry Rosina.
Opera Australia welcomes international singers Gordon Bintner and Michael Sumuel to the roles of Count Almaviva and Figaro. They’ll be joined by a strong line-up of local stars including Kiandra Howarth and Jane Ede who’ll be sharing the role of The Countess.
Siobhan Stagg has returned from her base in Europe to make her OA debut, in the role of Susanna and Emily Edmonds who, following her OA debut as Cinderella in Massenet’s Cendrillon earlier this year, will now take on the trouser role of Cherubino.
Set over the course of a single summer’s day, this opera is filled with drama as the characters, each motivated by their own desires, resort to a hilariously fast-paced spectacle of disguises, duplicity and trickery. Mozart sets the comedic pace immediately in the overture with strings scurrying all over the scale while cellos and basses murmuring away underneath.
Conductor Matteo Dal Maso will make his Opera Australia debut, leading the Orchestra through the ingenious score with its intricate yet tuneful melodies that are performed as trios, quartets and even one brilliant sextet.
Mozart composed The Marriage of Figaro in just six weeks and almost 250 years later, it continues to be hailed as a supreme masterpiece of operatic comedy. Energetic and endlessly tuneful, it features some of Mozart’s most recognisable compositions, undoubtedly why it is one of the most frequently performed operas around the world.
Conductor: Matteo Dal Maso | Director: David McVicar | Revival Director: Andy Morton | Featuring: Gordon Bintner, Kiandra Howarth, Jane Ede, Michael Sumuel, Siobhan Stagg, Emily Edmonds, Richard Anderson, Dominica Matthews, Virgilo Marino, Kanen Breen, Celeste Lazarenko, Clifford Plumpton, Annabelle Chaffey, Keara Donohoe, Opera Australia Chorus, Opera Australia Orchestra | Set & Costume Designer: Jenny Tiramani | Lighting Designer: David Finn
The Marriage of Figaro
Joan Sutherland Theatre – Sydney Opera House, Bennelong Point, Sydney
Season: 31 July – 27 August 2025
Information and Bookings: www.opera.org.au
Image: The Marriage of Figaro, 2022 – photo by Prudence Upton