Two new productions of operas by Rossini and Puccini will be helmed, respectively, by The Light in the Piazza's Bartlett Sher and Dirty Rotten Scoundrel's Jack O'Brien as part of the Metropolitan Opera's 2006-2007 season.
The Light in the Piazza creative team--set designer Michael Yeargan, costume designer Catherine Zuber and lighting designer Christopher Akerlind--will be on hand for Sher's production of Rossini's Il Barbiere di Siviglia. The opera will feature Diana Damrau as Rosina, Juan Diego Flórez as Count Almaviva with Peter
Mattei as Figaro, John Del Carlo as Dr. Bartolo and Samuel Ramey as Don
Basilio. With Maurizio Benini as conductor, it will begin performances on November 10th, 2006.
Tony Award-winner O'Brien will stage Puccini's
Il Trittico, which will begin performances on April 20th, 2007. The opera will feature Barbara Frittoli, Maria Guleghina, Olga Mykytenko, Stephanie Blythe,
Massimo Giordano, Salvatore Licitra, Alessandro Corbelli and Juan Pons; Maestro Levine will conduct the Met's orchestra. The design team will comprise Douglas W. Schmidt (sets), Jess Goldstein (costumes) and
Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer (lighting).
Sher received a Tony Award nomination for his work on
The Light in the Piazza; he also received Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards nods. As the artistic director of Seattle's Intiman Theatre, he directed
Cymbeline, Homebody/Kabul, Our Town, Titus Andronicus and others. O'Brien, who is the artistic director of San Diego's Old Globe Theatre, won Tony Awards for staging
Hairspray and
Henry IV, and was also nominated for his work on
Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, The Invention of Love, The Full Monty, Two Shakespearean Actors and
Porgy and Bess.
For more information, visit
www.metopera.org.
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