Met Opera’s New Production of I Puritani Puts Singers First

The Metropolitan Opera opened a new production of Vincenzo Bellini’s I Puritani on New Year’s Eve, a staging that critics say foregrounds vocal performance above all else. Director Charles Edwards delivers a deceptively traditional, singer-friendly production that accommodates the demands of bel canto and makes room for star turns across a three-hour drama of madness and thwarted love set during the English Civil War.

Lisette Oropesa stars as Elvira and drew praise for precision, agility and a seamlessly controlled passaggio as her character slides from bride to shattered woman. Lawrence Brownlee sang the Royalist Arturo, reaching a high F with effort in the final scene but returning quickly to his characteristic bright tone.

Artur Rucinski’s baritone gave Riccardo a complicated, self-destructive vigor, while Christian Van Horn’s bass-baritone brought muscle and warmth to Giorgio, Elvira’s uncle. Eve Gigliotti appears as the imprisoned queen. Conductor Marco Armiliato led the orchestra with an understated drive that kept the evening flowing, meeting the challenge of sustaining bel canto’s long, lyrical lines.

Edwards’s first Met production replaces Sandro Sequi’s 1976 staging and sets the action in a whitewashed 17th-century Puritan meetinghouse that progressively falls apart. Tim Mitchell’s lighting turns the stage a luminous green to represent Elvira’s warped mind, a device that contributes to a darker, less tidy finale than the opera’s usual deus-ex-machina resolution.

Key Topics

Culture, Metropolitan Opera, I Puritani, Lisette Oropesa, Lawrence Brownlee, Charles Edwards