THE MET: SCREENINGS FOR 2009-2010

The Metropolitan Opera is back, giving patrons live Met performances projected on the big screen in Staller Center’s Main Stage Theatre. Performances are in high definition with Dolby Digital surround sound. The Met: Live in HD Series will present nine live transmissions this season.

All programs begin at 1 pm.

Tickets are on sale now!  Follow this link to order tickets on-line.

Tickets: $22 general admission; $20 senior citizens with ID on file; $15 students and children through the Staller Center Box Office, (631) 632-ARTS [2787] or online at stallercenter.com.

Tosca*
Sunday, October 11, 2009 - 1 pm
Composer:  Giacomo Puccini
Conductor:  James Levine
Tosca:  Karita Mattila
Cavaradossi:  Marcelo Álvarez

*Rebroadcast from October 10

“Tosca combines Puccini’s glorious musical inspiration with the
melodramatic vitality of one of the great Hitchcock films,” says Met Music Director James Levine, who conducts this new production. The opera tells the story of three people—a famous opera singer, a free-thinking painter, and a sadistic chief of police—caught in a net of love and politics. Soprano Karita Mattila, recently seen in this season’s Live in HD presentation of Salome, sings the title role for the first time outside her native Finland. Luc Bondy, acclaimed for his imaginative theater and opera productions, directs. The cast also includes Marcelo Álvarez as Cavaradossi and George Gagnidze as Scarpia.

Approximate running time - 3 hours 30 minutes / 2 intermissions

Aida*
Sunday, October 25, 2009 - 1 pm
Composer:  Giuseppe Verdi
Conductor:  Daniele Gatti
Aida:  Violeta Urmana
Amneris:  Dolora Zajick

*Rebroadcast from October 24

Set in ancient Egypt, Aida is both a heartbreaking love story and
an epic drama full of spectacular crowd scenes. A cast of powerful
voices and a grand production bring the story to life on the Met
stage (and on the HD screen). Violeta Urmana stars in the title
role of the enslaved Ethiopian princess, with Dolora Zajick as her
rival. Johan Botha plays Radamès, commander of the Egyptian
army, and Daniele Gatti conducts. Among the score’s highlights is
the celebrated Triumphal March.

Approximate running time - 4 hours / 2 intermissions

Turandot*
Sunday, November 8, 2009 - 1 pm
Composer:  Giacomo Puccini
Conductor:  Andris Nelsons
Turandot:  Maria Guleghina
Liù:  Marina Poplavskaya

*Rebroadcast from November 7

Director Franco Zeffirelli’s breathtaking production of
Puccini’s last opera is a favorite of the Met repertoire.
Maria Guleghina plays the ruthless Chinese princess of
the title, whose hatred of men is so strong that she has
all suitors who can’t solve her riddles beheaded.
Marcello Giordani sings Calàf, the unknown prince
who eventually wins her love and whose solos include
the famous “Nessun dorma.”

Approximate running time - 3 hours 30 minutes / 2 intermissions

Der Rosenkavalier
Saturday, January 9, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer:  Richard Strauss
Conductor:  James Levine
Marschallin:  Renée Fleming
Octavian:  Susan Graham

Strauss’s comic masterpiece of love and intrigue in
18th-century Vienna stars Renée Fleming as the aristocratic
Marschallin and Susan Graham in the trouser role of her
young lover. Music Director James Levine conducts a cast that
also includes Kristinn Sigmundsson and Thomas Allen.

Approximate running time - 3 hours / 2 intermissions

Carmen
Saturday, January 16, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer:  Georges Bizet
Conductor:  Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Micaëla:  Barbara Frittoli
Carmen:  Elīna Garanča

Don José:  Roberto Alagna

One of the most popular operas of all time, Carmen “is about sex,
violence, and racism—and its corollary: freedom,” says Olivier
Award-winning director Richard Eyre about his new production of Bizet’s drama. “It is one of the inalienably great works of art.  It’s sexy, in every sense. And I think it should be shocking.”  Elīna Garanča sings the seductive gypsy of the title for the first time at the Met, opposite Roberto Alagna as the obsessed Don José.

Approximate running time - 4 hours / 2 intermissions

Les Contes d’Hoffmann*
Saturday, January 30, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer:  Jacques Offenbach
Conductor:  James Levine
Olympia:  Kathleen Kim
Antonia/Stella:  Anna Netrebko
Hoffmann:  Rolando Villazón

*Rebroadcast  from December 19, 2009

Tony Award® winner Bartlett Sher (South Pacific) directs this new
production, returning after the triumph of his Met Barber of Seville
(seen live in HD in the 2006–07 season). Offenbach’s fictionalized
take on the life and loves of the German Romantic writer E.T.A.
Hoffmann is a fascinating psychological journey. Met Music
Director James Levine conducts star tenor Rolando Villazón in the
tour-de-force title role, with Anna Netrebko as the tragic Antonia,
Elīna Garanča as the ambiguous Nicklausse, and René Pape as the
demonic four villains.

Approximate running time - 3 hours / 2 intermissions

Simon Boccanegra
Saturday, February 6, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer:  Giuseppe Verdi
Conductor:  James Levine
Amelia:  Adrianne Pieczonka
Gabriele Adorno:  Marcello Giordani
Simon Boccanegra:  Plácido Domingo

Four decades into a legendary Met career, tenor Plácido Domingo
makes history singing the title role in Verdi’s gripping political
thriller, which is written for a baritone. Adrianne Pieczonka,
Marcello Giordani, and James Morris are his co-stars in
this moving and tragic story of a father and his lost daughter.
James Levine conducts.

Approximate running time - 3 hours 40 minutes / 2 intermissions

Hamlet*
Sunday, March 28, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer: Ambroise Thomas
Conductor: Louis Langrée
Ophélie: Natalie Dessay
Gertrude: Jennifer Larmore
Laërte: Toby Spence
Hamlet: Simon Keenlyside
Claudius: James Morris

*Rebroadcast from March 27, 2010

The works of Shakespeare have inspired more operatic
adaptations than any other writer’s. Simon Keenlyside and
Natalie Dessay bring their extraordinary acting and singing skills
to two of the Bard’s most unforgettable characters in this new
production of Ambroise Thomas’s Hamlet. For the role of Ophelia,
the French composer created an extended mad scene that is
among the greatest in opera.

Approximate running time - 3 hours 45 minutes / 1 intermission

Armida
Saturday, May 1, 2010 - 1 pm
Composer:  Gioachino Rossini
Conductor:  Riccardo Frizza
Armida:  Renée Fleming
Rinaldo:  Lawrence Brownlee

This story of a sorceress who enthralls men in her island prison has
inspired operatic settings by a multitude of composers, including
Gluck, Haydn, and Dvorák. Renée Fleming stars in the title role of
Rossini’s version, opposite no fewer than six tenors. Tony Award®
winner Mary Zimmerman returns to direct this new production of
a work she describes as “a buried treasure, a box of jewels.” The
fanciful and magical tale, Zimmerman says, “has an epic,
enchanted quality and a tremendous visual element.”

Approximate running time - 4 hours 20 minutes / 2 intermissions