Tosca

The production is sumptuous and situates us firmly in 1800 Rome, where the rebel Angelotti flees the secret police to the Church of Sant’Andrea della Valle, magnificently realized. When the lights went up on Act I, the Met audience broke into applause, just as it always did with Zeffirelli spectacles. "The creative team didn’t even try to mask echoes of Zeffirelli throughout. But, with its painterly designs and sharply raked floors, the sets were an improvement over the 1985 staging, less garishly opulent, more attractive... Sonya Yoncheva and Vittorio Grigolo were both singing their roles for the first time, and they looked wonderfully youthful." (The New York Times)