100 Great Operas and Their Stories: Act-By-Act Synopses (13 page)

The last one to come to church is Alfio. Santuzza stops him, too, and almost before she knows it, has told him of the goings-on between Lola and Turiddu. Santuzza’s earnestness leaves no doubt in his mind that she is telling the truth. He runs off, swearing a terrible vengeance, and Santuzza, filled with remorse, follows him.

With the stage empty, the orchestra plays the lovely, devotional
Intermezzo
. It is an ironically peaceful comment on the murderous passions that have been aroused.

Now church is over, and the villagers pour happily out. Turiddu invites everyone to a drink and sings his gay
Brindisi
, or
Drinking Song
. But Alfio, in a menacing mood, comes on
the scene and angrily refuses Turiddu’s offer of a drink. The two men confront each other, a challenge is exchanged, and Alfio imperturbably answers Turiddu’s violent threats by saying he will meet him in the orchard. It is now Turiddu’s turn to be filled with remorse. He calls his mother, bids her take care of Santuzza, takes a tearful farewell, and runs off. The terror-stricken Santuzza rushes in with some frightened neighbors, and a moment later a woman screams that Turiddu has been murdered. Alfio has won his duel.

LA CENERENTOLA

(Cinderella)

Opera in two acts by Gioacchino Rossini with
libretto in Italian by Jacopo Ferretti, based on
Charles Guillaume Etienne’s three-act French
libretto
Cendrillon
for operas by Niccolò
Isouard and Daniel Steibelt

Time: unspecified, but the manners and customs are those of the 18th century

Place: Salerno

First performance at Rome, January 25, 1817

    Listen, my children (if there are any children listening to me), and you shall hear—the story of
Cinderella
. It is not the same story you have heard again and again. It is not quite the one told of old by Perrault, by the French Mother Goose—or even by our own Walt Disney. There are no glass slippers in our tale; there is no kind fairy godmother, and there is no unkind stepmother. But there is a handsome prince; there
are
two silly old stepsisters; and there is, of course, pretty Cinderella herself.

Perhaps if the opera had been written a hundred years earlier,
it might have had a pumpkin changing into a coach, magically appearing and disappearing finery, and all the other delightful tricks of the fairy tale. At that time Italian opera houses had all the machinery to represent magic. But when Rossini started to write the music on Christmas Day of 1817, the Valle Theater of Rome was much more modestly equipped, and its manager concocted a simpler tale for the maestro. He was also in a great hurry to have the opera, and so the composer did as he often did—borrow a few numbers from other operas he had already composed. The really delightful overture, for instance, he took from
La Gazzetta
, which he had composed for Naples only a few months earlier. He worked so fast—and so did the cast—that the first performance took place a month later. Perhaps for this reason it failed at first. But it soon became a huge success and for many years ranked in popularity, among Rossini’s works, next to
The Barber
and
William Tell
. But in the past fifty years or so it has seldom been given. I am not sure why—maybe because it takes singers who can sing even faster and more accurately than are required in
The Barber
, especially a coloratura contralto for the role of Cinderella, There aren’t many of those around.

ACT I

Scene 1
Any good contralto, however, could sing the quaint little ditty
(Una volta c’era un re
—“Once upon a time there was a king”) with which she opens the opera as she cooks coffee for her two spoiled stepsisters, Clorinda and Thisbe. It is, appropriately enough, about a king who chose a poor little good girl for his bride instead of any of the high and mighty ones he might have had. Soon they have a visitor. He is Alidoro, the Prince’s guide, philosopher, and friend, come in disguise as a beggar. When Cinderella treats him kindly and the sisters the opposite, he knows at least one piece of advice he can give his master.

Instead of a stepmother, as in the familiar story, Rossini supplies Cinderella with a stepfather. He is a pompous old
fool; and though he is already rich, he would like to be still richer. Don Magnifico is his name; and immediately on his entrance he tells his daughters of a silly dream he had. He dreamed he was an ass, and a very wealthy ass, too. The aria
(Miei rampolli femminini
—“My feminine offspring”) is much in the style of the
Largo al factotum
from
The Barber of Senile
.

When everyone finally leaves Cinderella alone to do the cleaning up, in comes the Prince. He is in disguise, and he is looking for a bride who will love him only for himself, not because he is a prince. Of course, he at once observes the attractive Cinderella working like a servant around the house. She, for her part, is so much startled at seeing a handsome young man that she lets a tray of dishes drop. At once they fall in love! Neither tells the other, of course, for that would end the story right there. Instead, they sing a charming duet together. It is interrupted at the end, for Cinderella’s two unpleasant stepsisters call to her to serve them. But Prince Ramiro’s heart has been captured—he does not know the girl’s real name.

And when Cinderella has gone off to serve her sisters, enter still one other man in disguise. This is Dandini, the Prince’s valet, who has changed clothes with his master. As he tries to pose as a prince (by misquoting Latin texts), Cinderella begs her stepfather to be allowed to go to the ball every girl is invited to. Naturally, her family unite in refusing the permission; but the act closes with Alidoro returning to promise our heroine help-just as the fairy godmother does in the fairy tale. All this gives Rossini a chance to write a wonderful concerted number to close the scene, complete with members of the Prince’s court who come in for no better dramatic reason than to swell out the sound and make a mighty effective finale.

Scene 2
takes place in the palace, where everyone is urging Dandini (still disguised as the Prince) to choose his bride. And who should come in but Clorinda and Thisbe, Cinderella’s very homely stepsisters? Both of them try to find favor with Dandini, for, of course, they think he is the Prince. He
flees from them to another room, where he reports to his master. In a very quick and funny duet he tells him what he thinks of these two girls. They are
just terrible
, he says. But the relentless girls come running after Dandini, and, to get rid of them, he explains that he can marry only one. The other he says, must marry his valet. That, of course, they cannot think of. The two men are laughing at the girls, when a mysterious lady is announced by Alidoro. The wise old philosopher has dressed up Cinderella beautifully and brought her to the palace. No one recognizes her, because she is masked; but everyone sees how beautiful she is, and all the court knows at once that this is the girl the Prince ought to marry. As they all sing about how they feel, the act closes with a wonderful chorus.

ACT II

Scene 1
Only the two fatuous sisters do not share the sentiments of the final chorus in the first act. They think the stranger looks so much like Cinderella that the Prince could not possibly be in love with her. Rather, each thinks she herself is going to win the marital sweepstakes—and, accordingly, they quarrel. Meanwhile, Dandini himself has fallen in love with Cinderella. Still disguised as the Prince, he proposes to her; but she tells him she has fallen in love with his valet. The Prince overhears this admission and (still disguised, of course, as Dandini) comes forward to propose marriage. She admits that she loves him, as she said; but first he must find out who she is. She gives him a bracelet that matches one she is wearing, as a clue—a sort of counterpart to the slipper business in the familiar story. As for Don Magnifico, he is certain that one of his daughters, either Clorinda or Thisbe, will marry the Prince. The silly old fellow is beside himself with happiness. He imagines how powerful he will be, how everyone will be begging favors of him, and how he will kick them all out. All this he tells us in the aria
Sia qualunque delle figlie
—“Whichever of my daughters.” But the old fool is in for a quick disappointment. He, like everyone else, thought that Dandini,
the valet, was really the Prince, just because he was wearing princely clothes. Now Dandini comes in and tells the old baron who he really is. Don Magnifico is outraged—angry—hurt. But Dandini, having given up Cinderella, is only amused.

Scene 2
takes us back to the Don’s house. Cinderella repeats her little ballad about the king who chose a wife for her goodness only. For she still does not know that it is the Prince, disguised as his own servant, who has fallen in love with her. A storm rages outside. (Rossini liked to write storm music, and this is an excellent example.) During it the Prince and Dandini, now each in his own costume, seek shelter; and Cinderella, trying to hide her face, lets the Prince see the bracelet on her arm. He steps forward, and at last Cinderella learns that the man she loves is not a servant at all, but really Prince Ramiro. Ramiro takes her by the hand and says that she, and only she, shall be his bride. Her relatives—Don Magnifico, Clorinda, and Thisbe—are all shocked and horrified, and they will not speak to her. But finally Don Magnifico decides to ask Ramiro for forgiveness. The Prince wants to have nothing to do with him, but the good, kind Cinderella, in the brilliant rondo
Nacqui all’affanno
—“Born to sorrow” pleads for the relatives who had treated her so shabbily. The Prince gives in to his radiant bride, and the opera ends with everyone rejoicing—and everyone, I presume, living happily ever after.

THE CONSUL

Opera in three acts by Gian-Carlo Menotti with
libretto in English by the composer

Time: after World War II

Place: somewhere in Europe

First performance at Philadelphia, March 1, 1950

    Gian-Carlo Menott’s first full-length opera was greeted, during its first year, with a three-gun salute by prize-giving groups. It received the Pulitzer Prize for 1950 as the most distinguished musical composition of the year, the New York Drama Critics Circle citation as the best musical play of the season, and the Donaldson Award as the best musical play of 1950. It enjoyed a good run on Broadway, and during 1951 it was produced in London, Hamburg, Zurich, Milan, and Vienna.

How long it may survive on the stage is a difficult question. It struck many hearers like a blow between the eyes, for it
deals with a peculiarly moving problem that occupied a great deal of space in the newspapers, magazines, and editorial comments of the early 1950’s. And though its problem is by no means finally settled as these words are written in the year 1956, the handling of it already suffers from changes in the world picture which make the libretto read a little like last year’s newspapers. Perhaps in another five years or more the sin of topicality may be removed and the libretto read like history. Let us devoutly hope so. And at such a time the merits of the score and the personal tragedy of Magda, John, and their family may stand out all the more sharply poignant.

ACT I

Scene 1
John Sorel does some unidentified work for some unidentified underground group in some unidentified country of Europe. The curtain rises on an empty room in his poor home early one morning as a neighboring phonograph plays a French jazz song,
“Tu reviendras
” (“You Will Return”). John staggers into the room; Magda runs in to bandage the leg where he has been shot; and he explains to her and his mother that the police had nicked him while he was escaping from a meeting that had been broken up. Through the window Magda sees police coming, and John just manages to get out of the window and climb up to a ledge before they enter.