Verona and the Opera pants - The Tragedy that was also a Comedy

After our trip to Verona for Pianogurl’s birthday, I was dying to see an Italian opera in the coliseum in Verona. So nearly as soon as our friends arrived from Rome, we hauled them up to Verona to take in the opera!

We arrived early, anxious to take our seats and enjoy the scrumptious picnic lunch I had prepared – chicken salad, homemade wheat bread, cantaloupe slices, grapes and gingersnaps. At the entrance, however, we were met with an astonishing fact. For all reserved seating at the opera, there’s a dress code. Dress code?! I didn’t read anything about a dress code anywhere! Argh! They assured us that we were welcome to take our place on the stone steps dressed as we were, but after shelling out good money to sit in the soft seats, there was no way we were sitting anywhere but in those soft seats!

Fortunately, we ladies were already wearing dresses and both guys were in collared shirts. We set off on a quest to find opera pants for the guys. Unfortunately, all of the shops along the road were either women’s shops or closed for the day. After walking nearly ¼ of a mile I was beginning to feel a little desperate. Should we buy beach towels and make long “skirts” for these husbands of ours? At last, we came to an open department store. Racing to the 3^rd floor, we began scanning the racks looking for cheap men’s pants in the appropriate sizes. Fortunately, both of our husbands wear sizes that are easy to find. We did have several good laughs watching our conservative men modeling the highly fashionable (and slightly ridiculous looking) European skinny pants, but we purchased and emerged from the store victorious! Unfortunately, the Linguist ended up with a pair that cost $50! Yikes! He maintained that he could wear them to church later, but after seeing them on, I have forbidden him to ever wear them anywhere but the opera.

We scooted back down the road to the opera gate, fearful that the shifts would’ve changed and we’d meet new ushers requiring ties, but all was well, and we were admitted without any more difficulty. Whew!

We found our seats and I passed out plates of chicken salad in full view of at least four different ushers. We ate and the show began! We were near the back of the section on the floor, but could hear well and see okay. It helped that the men had remembered to bring binoculars, so with each scene change we took a good look at the costumes and new stage elements.

The show we watched was Il Trovatore by Girabaldi.  It opens with the re-telling of the tragedy that has befallen the Di Luna family. Years ago they had a young daughter who died. A local gypsy woman was blamed for the death of the baby and burned at the stake. Innocent, she charged her daughter with exacting her revenge by stealing the family’s youngest son and burning him alive. Distraught at having watched the death of her mother, the terrified daughter took the son, but mistakenly burned her own child, saving the baby she was supposed to kill. As the years passed, she raised this child as her own – tortured by the fact that she loved him as a mother, but in doing so, was betraying her own mother. Meanwhile, the eldest son, Captain Ferrando Di Luna, has been charged by his dying father to seek his lost brother and bring him home.

After this background information, the story opens at the present day and introduces Leonora and the two men who are in love with her – ironically, the two brothers. One is now a powerful political figure and the other (the one raised by the gypsy) a renegade because of his political views. A duel ensues when our heroine mistakes one for the other in the darkness. Fearing her lover (the gypsy boy) has been killed, she decides to take her vows and become a nun. The set for this was pretty ingenious as a tower set in the middle of the stage opens to reveal a glittering, gold interior reminiscent of many of the churches we’ve toured in Italy.

Photo of the mock up of the nunnery where Leonora goes to give herself to God.  

 Our hero arrives in time to keep her from taking her vows (he actually won the duel and didn’t kill his opponent for some mystical reason he doesn’t understand until the gypsy daughter explains that the other man is, in truth, his brother) and whisks her away to marry her. Of course, his nemesis also arrives, so there’s some posturing by each of the two armies the men command. I actually enjoyed all of these larger scenes much more than the solo scenes of the lead players. The costumes and choreographer were exciting to see, and I think my favorite of all were the scenes with the gypsies. The tortured daughter gypsy had an amazing voice and the expression on her face would have sent me running the other way. Additionally, the solo scenes were a lot longer and not being able to understand the words, I kept wondering what we were missing…

But back to the plot – the gypsy daughter ends up captured by the Captain Ferrando's men and when she says she will appeal to Manrico for help, then Ferrando knows he has ammunition to destroy his opponent. Sure enough, he’s able to capture Manrico who comes to the aid of the only mother he’s ever known. Leonora appeals to him, promising to marry him if he’ll just let her lover go free. He agrees to the proposition and grants her access to the dungeon to see her lover one last time. Here, she reveals to her lover that she’s taken poison and will soon die rather than betray their love. Unfortunately, Ferrando who is standing behind her, hears this revelation as well. As soon as Leonora dies, he kills the gypsy lover, at which point the gypsy daughter reveals to him that he’s just killed the brother he’s been searching for his whole life and then kills herself. Ferrando kills himself, too. The show ends with this final death scene of all four of the main characters.

I don’t remember at exactly what point we had an intermission break, but as we were standing to stretch our legs and munching our gingersnaps we were told that no food was allowed in that area of the arena – just drinks. I couldn’t help laughing since we’d passed out plates of chicken salad just an hour before and no one said a word. No wonder the folks in front of us were scowling! We’ve just gotten so used to the scowls, that I didn’t pick up on the fact that anything was wrong!

All in all, I enjoyed my first Italian opera immensely and started plotting how I could attend all of them that are playing this season. Unfortunately, they begin at 9:15 p.m. and our show didn’t finish until well past midnight, so it makes the 1 ½ hour trek home (by the time you walk to the car and then drive) REALLY late. But since they run 5 shows each year, and do a different show each night, in theory, we could stay in Verona for a few days and see them all! The Linguist, however, says that one Italian opera is enough for him. His box is checked. In my opinion, he just doesn’t want to wear his opera pants again…