Adriana Lecou­vreur

Adriana Lecouvreur lives for art. With intense acting and unpathetic naturalness, the actress captivates her audience night after night. Director Michonnet has also adored her for a long time - haplessly. Because apart from acting, her only love is Maurizio. For Adriana, he has ended his secret relationship with an influential princess. Furious with jealousy, she seeks revenge...

She really existed: the actress Adrienne Lecouvreur, the undisputed star of the Comédie Française from 1717, then 23 years young. Every evening, more than 1000 people of every rank cheered her. When she died suddenly 13 years later, entangled in a passionate relationship with Moritz of Saxony, dramatic rumors soon surrounded her death: the jealous Princess of Bouillon had poisoned her rival... Neither playwright Eugène Scribe, nor Sarah Bernhard, the Adrienne of the 1849 premiere, nor Francesco Cilèa could escape this colportage drama. They skillfully combined historical and biographical facts with invented rumors to create a tense, intricate love triangle. Francesco Cilèa, a celebrated contemporary of Puccini's at the time, seems in places to anticipate early film music in the elegant score, rich in melody and color, with expressive, supple vocal parts. In 1902, with Enrico Caruso in the role of Maurizio, "Adriana Lecouvreur" celebrated its brilliant world premiere at La Scala in Milan.

Director and set designer Gianluca Falaschi locates the look behind the scenes and into the emotional world of a great diva at the fragile zenith of her popularity in the art and dream world of theater in the style of Hollywood's Golden Era, where reality and illusion, people and their roles intersect: What is reality, what is art? What remains when the spotlight fades?

A production of Staatstheater Mainz