Manon Lescaut

Manon Lescaut Giacomo Puccini Manon Lescaut, or the cruel reality of a thwarted love story magnified by Puccini's lyricism.

Cast

Lorenzo Passerini | conductor

Oliver Mears | stage director

Ailyn Pérez | Manon Lescaut

Roberto Alagna | Le Chevalier des Grieux

Lionel Lhote | Lescaut

Nicola Ulivieri | Géronte de Ravoir

Léo Vermot-Desroches | Edmond / Le maître de ballet / Un allumeur de réverbères

Mathilde Ortscheidt | Un chanteur

Maurel Endong | L’aubergiste / Le sergent

Orchestre National de France

accentus | chorus master Christophe Grapperon

In a few words

Puccini wrote only ten operas in a forty-year career, and Manon Lescaut holds a special place in his body of work as it was his first major success, definitively establishing his reputation. For this story, which had already been set to music by Auber and Massenet, he went through seven librettists before being fully satisfied. The result is a profoundly lyrical work, with numerous unforgettable arias and duets exalting love and frivolity, leading to Manon's exile and death in distant Louisiana. For this work, so rarely performed in Paris in recent decades, a dream cast is assembled, notably featuring the Manon of American Ailyn Pérez, vocally and theatrically sumptuous, and the des Grieux of Roberto Alagna, whose Latin temperament and vocal prowess work wonders in this repertoire. On this occasion, he makes his grand return to a Parisian opera stage and even appears on Avenue Montaigne for the first time in a staged production. In the pit, the “National” orchestra reunites with Lorenzo Passerini's baton. Oliver Mears (Handel's Semele) also returns, once again exploring the intricacies of desire in our modern world and male-female relationships.

New production

Co-production Théâtre des Champs-Élysées | Royal Opera, Covent Garden, London | Opéra Nice Côte d’Azur