Woody Allen's production of the Puccini comic opera at LA Opera in 2015
Lauretta
Rinuccio
Zita
Nella
Simone
Academician and piano expert David Dubal narrates this absorbing documentary chronicling the instrument's history and featuring some of the 20th century's finest pianists via archival film clips. Among the keyboard virtuosos are Vladimir Horowitz, Claudio Arrau, Van Cliburn and Glenn Gould. Extras include Arrau's 1983 performance of Ludwig van Beethoven's Piano Concerto no. 4, accompanied by the Philadelphia Orchestra under maestro Riccardo Muti.
Manga artist Gengo Odaka lands a job with the World Children's Land amusement park only to become suspicious of the organization when a garbled message is discovered on tapes. As Gengo and his team investigate, Godzilla and Anguirus quickly decipher the message and begin their own plan of action.
A man is imprisoned for a crime he didn't commit. When his wife is murdered and his son kidnapped and taken to Mexico, he devises an elaborate and dangerous plan to rescue his son and avenge the murder.
The gang find themselves in a tinsel-town twist! While on a VIP tour of the legendary Brickton Studios, Scooby and friends get a first-hand experience of the rumored hauntings when classic movie monsters drop in for a creepy casting call.
Reporter Goro Maki stumbles upon scientists conducting weather experiments on Sollgel Island in the South Seas. He discovers the island is inhabited by giant mantis and a woman named Saeko who's been cast away since the death of her father. The pair soon find a helpless infant monster that Godzilla must adopt and learn to raise as one of his own.
'Skippy' seeks to win the love of celebrities and a women by getting his photograph taken with as many famous people as possible.
An actor who enjoyed success in his youth finds his career and life in a downward spiral as he gets older.
Clay Kincaid hates the nickname 'Saint', he got for being too kind to stray animals and desperate people. Especially when it comes to women. With a rough and damaged past that has left him jaded, he doesn't do committed relationships. This is before he meets Samantha Jamieson, an heiress turned runaway in need of help. When she starts to work as a waitress at his bar, he discovers that she is someone truly special and amazing… someone that could warm his damaged heart.
A mysterious Dark Horseman slays young girls near the village of Dikanka, and he has already butchered 11 ladies. Nikolai Gogol, a scribe from Saint Petersburg has to take charge of the investigation, but the closer he gets to solving the case, the more fits he has, causing macabre visions. When he learns the next victim is his beloved, Liza, he doubts that he can protect her and resist the murderer. Fortunately, he meets somebody who can help him: Khoma Brut, the witch hunter, martial artist and philosopher. Together they spend three dreadful nights in an old chapel reading the funeral service for Ulyana, the witch, and calling upon the ghastly evil spirit Viy.
A young Israeli man absconds to Paris to flee his nationality, aided by his trusty Franco-Israeli dictionary.
When Mac—Shannon’s new beau—first moved to Lighthouse Cove, he bought the historic lighthouse mansion that the town is named after. During renovation demolition, the bones of a teenage girl who went missing fifteen years ago were discovered. If Shannon has any chance of getting the renovation back on track, she’ll need to tackle the cold case.
Ambitious overachiever Hanna just needs one more kid before her life is perfect. Instead, her baby daddy unexpectedly dumps her. Suddenly, she finds herself without a place to live, job or family. With every fiber of her being set for victory, Hanna refuses to give up and decides to win him back. But to get there means having to win something much more important, love and desire for herself and who she is.
Madea's back - hallelujer! And she's not putting up with any nonsense as family drama erupts at her great-grandson's college graduation celebration.
A corrupt police officer enjoys all the perks of being an immoral and unethical police officer until an event which transforms his life completely and forces him to choose the righteous path.
Susanna gladly accepts help one day from handsome stranger Nate at her parents’ garden store in small-town Georgia. Sparks between them fly, but when a photo of them gets leaked to the press, Susanna is in for the shock of her life when Nate is called back home by his mother… For his coronation as the King Nathaniel of Cambria!
A teenager struggles to keep her scandal-ridden past and a big secret from getting out when she strikes up an unlikely romance with the crown prince.
Set in the mid sixties and shot with more black than white, ‘SAD?’ is a dark ten minute film that explores the time that we spend alone watching television, and the good and sad effects it can have on you. The film has a timeless, forgotten feel about it, a study of a world and time detached from the norm, a life filled with both laughter and loneliness, escapism and escapees...
In the fourth instalment of the Gabriel's Inferno series, Professor Gabriel Emerson has embarked on a passionate, yet clandestine affair with his former student Julia Mitchell, but when they return from their romantic holiday in Italy, their happiness is threatened. Will Gabriel succumb to Dante's fate?
An American pilot is sent to a Chinese province to teach a crew of would-be pilots how to fly war planes against the Japanese during World War II.
Zaporozhets za Dunayem (Ukrainian: Запорожець за Дунаєм, translated as A Zaporozhian (Cossack) Beyond the Danube, also referred to as Cossacks in Exile) is a Ukrainian comic opera with spoken dialogue in three acts with music and libretto by the composer Semen Hulak-Artemovsky (1813–1873). The orchestration has subsequently been rewritten by composers such as Reinhold Glière and Heorhiy Maiboroda. This is one of the best-known Ukrainian comic operas depicting national themes.
A musician is offered a job in Vienna as stage director, but his disagreements with the aristocratic opera manager end in abrupt firing in spite of a mutual attraction. He's quickly engaged by another theatre and becomes famous for his lavish stage productions and fine acting, which begins their golden age with Suppé and Strauss.
Car Men is a collaboration between the renowned choreographer Jíri Kylían and filmmaker Boris Paval Conen. Based on the opera 'CARMEN' by Georges Bizet they shot a hilarious and poetic short film in the destroyed landscape of a Czech brown coal mine. The actors in this film are older dancers from Kylían's troupe (around 50 years old) and the main prop is a 'TATRA 87', a famous car from 1937.
This is a good video of "Figaro", but there are a couple of better ones available. The Bohm and the Pappano are better still due to the female members of the casts. The reason for buying this one is the "Figaro", Bryn Terfel. No one can top him today in that role. John Eliot Gardiner also stands out. Many of us have voiced their opinion that If the Metropolitan Opera would release it's 1998 version, that would be the one to get.
All the throbbing eroticism—and ultimate heartbreak—of Puccini’s youthful score is unleashed by James Levine and his top-flight cast. Plácido Domingo is Des Grieux, the handsome, headstrong young aristocrat who falls head over heels for the enticing, impetuous Manon Lescaut (Renata Scotto). Manon returns his love, but her obsession with luxury ruins them both. Gian Carlo Menotti’s opulent production, with sets and costumes by Desmond Heeley, superbly captures the colorful world of 18th century France.
Diana Damrau and Vittorio Grigolo are opera’s classic lovers in Gounod’s lush Shakespeare adaptation. Director Bartlett Sher’s “brilliant and inspired new production … is a revelation” (Huffington Post), and has already won acclaim for its vivid 18th-century milieu and stunning costumes during runs at Salzburg and La Scala. Emmanuel Villaume conducts the sumptuous score.
The legendary Plácido Domingo brings another new baritone role to the Met under the baton of his longtime collaborator James Levine. Liudmyla Monastyrska is Abigaille, the warrior woman determined to rule empires, and Jamie Barton is the heroic Fenena. Dmitri Belosselskiy is the stentorian voice of the oppressed Hebrew people.
Semyon Bychkov conducts a cast of young, up-and-coming talent including American soprano Corinne Winters in a new production of Mozart’s opera on the nature of love.
The Queen of the Night enlists a handsome prince named Tamino to rescue her beautiful kidnapped daughter, Princess Pamina. Aided by the lovelorn bird hunter Papageno and a magical flute that holds the power to change the hearts of men, young Tamino embarks on a quest for true love, leading to the evil Sarastro's temple where Pamina is held captive.
Who loves whom in Così fan tutte, Mozart’s and Da Ponte’s cruelly comic reflection on desire, fidelity and betrayal? Or have the confusions to which the main characters subject one another ensured that in spite of the heartfelt love duets and superficially fleetfooted comedy nothing will work any longer and that a sense of emotional erosion has replaced true feelings? Così fan tutte is a timeless work full of questions that affect us all. The Academy Award-winning director Michael Haneke once said that he was merely being precise and did not want to distort reality. In only his second opera production after Don Giovanni in 2006, he presents what ARTE described as a “disillusioned vision of love in an ice-cold, realistic interpretation”.
Rigoletto is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi. The Italian libretto was written by Francesco Maria Piave based on the play Le roi s'amuse by Victor Hugo. Despite serious initial problems with the Austrian censors who had control over northern Italian theatres at the time, the opera had a triumphant premiere at La Fenice in Venice on 11 March 1851. This 1994 recording, directed by Riccardo Muti, stars Roberto Alagna, Renato Bruson and Andrea Rost.
The first words uttered by Carmen mark one of the greatest entrances in the history of opera and express all that need be said: “Love is a rebellious bird that no one can tame…” With a devilish sway of the hips and a hint of Andalusian flair, the beautiful cigar-maker sets her sights on a soldier: Don José. Fate will do the rest.
La traviata (Italian: [la traˈviaːta], "The Fallen Woman"[1][2]) is an opera in three acts by Giuseppe Verdi set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. It is based on La dame aux Camélias (1852), a play adapted from the novel by Alexandre Dumas, fils. The opera was originally entitled Violetta, after the main character. It was first performed on 6 March 1853 at the La Fenice opera house in Venice. Piave and Verdi wanted to follow Dumas in giving the opera a contemporary setting, but the authorities at La Fenice insisted that it be set in the past, "c. 1700". It was not until the 1880s that the composer and librettist's original wishes were carried out and "realistic" productions were staged.[3]
Concert and documentary celebrating the 1st Anniversary of Moscow’s Zaryadye Hall
Franco Zeffirelli directs these two legendary La Scala productions telling tragic tales of jealousy. Mascagni's Cavalleria Rusticana features performances by Elena Obraztsova, Plácido Domingo, and Renato Bruson. Leoncavallo's I Pagliacci stars Teresa Stratas, Plácido Domingo, and Juan Pons. Both are conducted by George Pretre. This production of Pagliacci earned director Franco Zeffirelli the coveted Emmy as Best Director in the category of Classical Music Programming.
A self-contained and uniquely seductive world featuring custom built drones with live video feeds, laser set-design, opera singers and an original libretto that combines to drive a narrative of desire, fear and destruction.