A profoundly humane comedy, Le Nozze di Figaro is a remarkable marriage of Mozart’s music at the height of his genius and one of the best librettos ever set. In adapting a play that caused a scandal with its revolutionary take on 18th-century society, librettist Lorenzo Da Ponte focused less on the original topical references and more on the timeless issues embedded in the frothy drawing-room comedy.

Le Nozze di Figaro’s amazing score mirrors the complex world it depicts. The first impression is one of tremendous beauty and elegance. Dig a little deeper, and you’ll find all the underlying pain and deception, with a constant tension between the social classes and the sexes, where each character has something to gain and something to hide.

Conductor Joana Mallwitz makes her Met debut leading an extraordinary cast: bass-baritone Michael Sumuel as Figaro, soprano Olga Kulchynska as Susanna, baritone Joshua Hopkins as the scheming Count, soprano Federica Lombardi as his distressed wife, and mezzo-soprano Sun-Ly Pierce as the adolescent page Cherubino.

Sun-Ly Pierce is a talented local artist and a proud native of Utica, New York. Pierce is featured as the comedic pageboy Cherubino, a beloved “trouser role” written for a female singer portraying a male character. A profoundly humane comedy, “Le Nozze di Figaro,” pairs Mozart’s genius with one of opera’s most celebrated librettos.

Language: Italian
Run Time: 3 hrs., 55 min., with one intermission
Tickets: $30 General Public | $24 Members | $15 Students
To purchase tickets at the student price, call 315-797-0055.

Cinema Series Sponsor: Elizabeth R. Lemieux, PhD.