Three emojis (T.J. Miller, James Corden, Anna Faris) embark on an epic adventure through a smartphone to save their world from deletion.

The Jungle Bunch follows a gang of misfit animals on a mission to protect their jungle home. In their first big screen adventure, the Jungle Bunch’s tiger striped Kung Fu penguin leader Maurice and his comrades – a goldfish, tarsier and gorilla – fight to protect the jungle from a gang of silly baboons lead by Igor the evil Koala.

DreamWorks Animation and the director of Madagascar invite you to meet a most unusual baby. He wears a suit, speaks with the voice and wit of Alec Baldwin, and stars in the animated comedy, DreamWorks' The Boss Baby. The Boss Baby is a hilariously universal story about how a new baby's arrival impacts a family, told from the point of view of a delightfully unreliable narrator, a wildly imaginative 7 year old named Tim. With a sly, heart-filled message about the importance of family, DreamWorks' The Boss Baby is an authentic and broadly appealing original comedy for all ages.

Kingsman: The Secret Service” introduced the world to Kingsman - an independent, international intelligence agency operating at the highest level of discretion, whose ultimate goal is to keep the world safe. In “Kingsman: The Golden Circle,” our heroes face a new challenge. When their headquarters are destroyed and the world is held hostage, their journey leads them to the discovery of an allied spy organization in the US called Statesman, dating back to the day they were both founded. In a new adventure that tests their agents’ strength and wits to the limit, these two elite secret organizations band together to defeat a ruthless common enemy, in order to save the world, something that’s becoming a bit of a habit for Eggsy…

Abdul Karim arrives from India to participate in Queen Victoria's golden jubilee. The young clerk is surprised to find favor with the queen herself. As Victoria questions the constrictions of her long-held position, the two forge an unlikely and devoted alliance that her household and inner circle try to destroy. As their friendship deepens, the queen begins to see a changing world through new eyes, joyfully reclaiming her humanity.

When children begin to disappear in the town of Derry, Maine, a group of young kids are faced with their biggest fears when they square off against an evil clown named Pennywise, whose history of murder and violence dates back for centuries.

Black ops recruit Mitch Rapp (Dylan O'Brien) is reeling from the death of his fiancée in a terrorist attack when he is assigned to shadowy CIA figure Stan Hurley (Michael Keaton) to receive special training in tracking terrorists. Rapp and Hurley are then dispatched to join a Turkish agent on a mission to stop a mysterious operative from unleashing chaos of international proportions.

A couple's relationship is tested when uninvited guests arrive at their home, disrupting their tranquil existence. From filmmaker Darren Aronofsky (Black Swan, Requiem for a Dream), mother! stars Jennifer Lawrence, Javier Bardem, Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeiffer in this riveting psychological thriller about love, devotion and sacrifice

Prince Tamino promises the Queen of the Night that he will rescue her daughter Pamina from the enchanter Sarastro. He begins his quest, accompanied by the bird-catcher Papageno – but all is not as it seems...David McVicar’s classic production embraces both the seriousness and comedy of Mozart’s work. The audience is transported to a fantastical world of dancing animals, flying machines and dazzlingly starry skies. The setting provides a wonderful backdrop for Mozart’s kaleidoscopic score, from the Queen of the Night’s coloratura fireworks to Tamino and Pamina’s lyrical love duets and Papageno’s hearty, folksong-like arias. As well as being a comedy The Magic Flute is an expression of Mozart’s profound spiritual beliefs: Enlightenment concerns with the search for wisdom and virtue are at the heart of this enchanting tale. The Magic Flute was an instant success with audiences and Mozart’s supposed rival Salieri described it as an ‘operone’ – a great opera.<P>

APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS 10 MINUTES, INCLUDING

ONE INTERVAL | SUNG IN GERMAN

WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN open its fifth season with Canaletto & the Art of Venice, an immersive journey into the life and art of Venice’s famous view-painter. No artist better captures the essence and allure of Venice than Giovanni Antonio Canal, better known as Canaletto. <P>

The remarkable group of over 200 paintings, drawings and prints on display offer unparalleled insight into the artistry of Canaletto and his contemporaries, and the city he became a master at capturing. The film also offers the chance to step inside two official royal residences - Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle – to learn more about the artist, and Joseph Smith, the man who introduced Canaletto to Britain. <P>

Cinema-goers will embark on their very own 21st century Grand Tour, visiting the sites enjoyed by their 18th century counterparts and immortalised in Canaletto’s views - from the Rialto Bridge to the Piazza San Marco, and the Palazzo Ducale to the Church of Santi Giovanni e Paolo. Guided by Royal Collection Trust curators and the world’s leading experts in Venetian history, the film is not only a wonderful way to see the exhibition, but an opportunity to get closer to Canaletto and the city that inspired him.

The End of The End chronicles the final tour from the band who forged the sound of metal - Black Sabbath. After nearly 50 years together, the Birmingham band took to the stage for the last time in their home city, bringing down the curtain on their final tour ever. They performed generation-spanning songs that have defined a genre in front of a sold-out arena and, in exclusive new interviews, the band themselves tell it how they lived it. After half a century, this is your chance to hear the final word from the greatest metal band of all time.

Bruno Volta is a real specialist in solving puzzles and seeing through people inside out.  One day his sense of figuring things out and earning money is put in a state of readiness.

His much younger partner Agnieszka meets a girl called Vicky under unusual circumstances. The new friend finds a mysterious and extremely precious object in the wall of an old building. Volta cannot miss opportunity worth millions.

Together with his bodyguard Dycha, Volta decides to hit the jackpot and he will do anything to take possession of this extraordinary thing. But it will not be easy, because the innocent Vicky is in fact a strong opponent.

When Rodolfo, a penniless poet, meets Mimì, a seamstress, they fall instantly in love. But

their happiness is threatened when Rodolfo learns that Mimì is gravely ill. Acclaimed director Richard Jones (Boris Godunov, Il trittico) directs a new production of Puccini’s La Bohème. Irresistible in its witty, passionate blend of comedy and tragedy, the opera focusses on the lives of a group of young artists as they eke out an existence on the bohemian fringes of Paris, the capital of the 19th century. Jones brings his characteristically acute insight to this much-loved classic, visualized in Stewart Laing’s spectacular, stylized 1850s setting. Puccini’s romantic depiction of bohemian Paris, with memorable music and a love story drawn from everyday life, has captivated audiences around the world, making La Bohème one of the best-loved of all operas. It was first performed in Covent Garden in 1897 and has had more than five hundred performances there since.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

2 HOURS 35 MINUTES, INCLUDING

ONE INTERVAL | SUNG IN ITALIAN

WITH ENGLISH SURTITLES

Academy Award Academy Award® nominee Benedict Cumberbatch (BBC’s Sherlock, The Imitation Game) takes on the title role of Shakespeare’s great tragedy.

Now seen by over 750,000 people worldwide, the original 2015 NT Live broadcast returns to cinemas.

As a country arms itself for war, a family tears itself apart. Forced to avenge his father’s death but paralysed by the task ahead, Hamlet rages against the impossibility of his predicament, threatening both his sanity and the security of the state. Directed by Lyndsey Turner (Posh, Chimerica) and produced by Sonia Friedman Productions. ® nominee Benedict Cumberbatch (BBC's Sherlock, The Imitation Game, Frankenstein at the National Theatre) takes on the title role of Shakespeare's great tragedy. Directed by Lyndsey Turner (Posh, Chimerica) and produced by Sonia Friedman Productions, National Theatre Live will broadcast this eagerly awaited production live to cinemas.

As a country arms itself for war, a family tears itself apart. Forced to avenge his father's death but paralysed by the task ahead, Hamlet rages against the impossibility of his predicament, threatening both his sanity and the security of the state.

Bellini’s masterpiece boasts one of the most famous arias in all of opera, the beautiful “Casta diva.” Directed by Sir David McVicar, this evocative new production sets the action deep in a Druid forest, where nature and ancient ritual rule. The priestess Norma is torn between loyalty to her oppressed people and love for a Roman soldier. On the eve of a Druid revolt, she must choose between two agonising betrayals—only to learn that she herself has already been betrayed. Sondra Radvanovsky as Norma and Joyce DiDonato as her rival Adalgisa lead a cast of bel canto heavyweights, with Joseph Calleja as Norma’s unfaithful lover, Pollione, and British favourite Matthew Rose returning to the Met as Norma’s father, Oroveso.

BROADCAST LIVE FROM THE NATIONAL GALLERY PRESENTED BY BFI LONDON FILM FESTIVAL

MONDAY OCTOBER 9TH

The life and controversial death of Vincent van Gogh as told by his paintings and by the characters that inhabit them. Beginning a year after his demise, this portrait of the artist is built via a series of interviews conducted by Armand Roulin (Douglas Booth) – a regular model for the artist’s portraits – who becomes obsessed with van Gogh’s death, caused by a bullet wound to the stomach. Was it an accident? Was it suicide? LOVING VINCENT sets out to explore one of art’s great mysteries.

LOVING VINCENT stars Douglas Booth, Jerome Flynn, Chris O’Dowd, Oscar-nominee Saoirse Ronan, Aidan Turner, Helen McCrory, Eleanor Tomlinson and John Sessions.

The film will be followed by a Q&A with directors Dorota Kobiela and Hugh Welchman and special guests, live from the National Gallery.

A full-throttle war play that revels in the sweat of the battlefield, Coriolanus transports us back to the emergence of the republic of Rome.<p>

Caius Martius Coriolanus is a fearless soldier but a reluctant leader. His ambitious mother attempts to carve him a path to political power, but he struggles to change his nature and do what is required to achieve greatness. In this new city state struggling to find its feet, where the gap between rich and poor is widening every day, Coriolanus must decide who he really is and where his allegiances lie.<P>

Rome Season Director, Angus Jackson, completes the Royal Shakespeare Company’s collection of Shakespeare’s Roman plays with a visceral production which sees Sope Dirisu (One Night in Miami, Donmar Warehouse, 2016) take on the title role.

‘Botoks’ tells a story of several men and women working in a hospital, where sweat, tears and blood is shed every day. The director, Patryk Vega, shows that the world of medicine in Poland is not any less violent or corrupted than the world of the police and mafia, that was the subject of Vega’s previous movie “Pitbull. Tough Women.”

Daniela (Olga Boladz) and her brother (Tomasz Oswiecinski) ride the ambulance until she starts working for a pharmaceutical company. When a gynecologist specializing in abortions (Katarzyna Warnke) gets pregnant, hospital director (Janusz Chabior) tries to fire her. Doctor Beata (Agnieszka Dygant) loses her fiancé in a motorcycle crash. While stealing strong painkillers from the hospital, she meets Marek (Sebastian Fabijanski), a hospital orderly haunted by his own demons…

Experience Mozart’s irresistible fantasy in all its glory! Will brave Prince Tamino rescue Princess Pamina from the clutches of the evil Sarastro, and will Papageno the foolish bird catcher learn wisdom enough to help him? The Queen of the Night’s aria, with its stratospheric high notes, is just one of the countless highlights in this tale of love and magic, mysterious secrets, and whimsical fantasy. Julie Taymor’s (The Lion King) enchanting production captures both the opera’s earthy comedy and its enlightened nobility. Met Music Director Emeritus James Levine conducts a cast of rising young stars.  

CARMEN deals with the love and jealousy of naïve soldier Don José who’s lured away from his beloved by the gypsy factory-girl Carmen, whom he allows to escape from custody. Staged by Argentine director Valentina Carrasco, this is a modern interpretation performed in the enchanting setting of the Terme di Caracalla in Rome, the archaeological site of the Roman Baths where a unique theatrical stage comes to life.

“Why should I be indiscreet when my silence can do him no harm, and possibly protect him? Why warn the sleeper of the storm cloud overhead?... It is enough for me to guide it away from you in silence, so that you may waken to clear skies.”  - The Marquis of Posa, Don Carlos, Schiller, Act IV, Scène 6<P>

If there exists an opera that defies boundaries at every level, be they dramatic or dramaturgical, it is certainly Verdi’s Don Carlos, a work by an Italian composer created in French, and in which the climate of war with Spain and the melancholy of human beings draw our attention to the fate to Flanders. <P>

Politics, religion, history and psychoanalysis are all entwined here, increasingly exacerbating the fears and taboos between the protagonists. Krzysztof Warlikowski strips down a tragedy haunted by ghosts, and places the intimate at the heart of an imaginary fresco truer than history itself. Along with Philippe Jordan, he reveals to the public the very first version of this great five-act opera: the version modified by Verdi himself for the work’s first performance in 1867. Echoing this historic version, the Paris Opera will be scheduling the five-act version of Don Carlos in Italian in 2019.

Amidst a bustling market, the pirate Conrad falls in love at first sight with the beautiful Medora, the ward of the slave merchant Lankedem’s bazaar. Conrad kidnaps Medora when Lanquedem decides to sell her to the Pasha.

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Inspired by Lord Byron’s epic poem and reworked by Alexei Ratmansky from Petipa’s exotic 19th century classic, this miracle of the repertoire is one of the Bolshoi’s most lavish productions. Complete with a magnificent awe-inspring shipwreck and dramatic scenery, this grand romance allows enough dancing for nearly the entire company and made especially for those who seek miracles in theatre.

At a garden party on a sunny afternoon, Alice is surprised to see her parents’ friend Lewis Carroll transform into a white rabbit. When she follows him down a rabbit hole events become curiouser and curiouser... As Alice journeys through Wonderland, she encounters countless strange creatures. She’s swept off her feet by the charming Knave of Hearts, who’s on the run for stealing the tarts. Confusion piles upon confusion. Then Alice wakes with a start. Was it all a daydream? Christopher Wheeldon’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland burst onto the stage in 2011 in an explosion of colour, stage magic and inventive, sophisticated choreography. Joby Talbot’s score combines contemporary soundworlds with sweeping melodies that gesture to ballet scores of the 19th century. Bob Crowley’s wildly imaginative, eye-popping designs draw on everything from puppetry to projections to make Wonderland wonderfully real. Alice encounters a cast of extraordinary and instantly recognizable characters, from the highly strung Queen of Hearts – who performs a hilarious send-up of The Sleeping Beauty 's famous Rose Adage – to a playing-card corps de ballet, a sinuous caterpillar and a tap-dancing Mad Hatter. But the ballet does not avoid the darker undercurrents of Lewis Carroll’s story: a nightmarish kitchen, an eerily disembodied Cheshire Cat and the unhinged tea party are all here in vivid detail. The delicious result shows The Royal Ballet at its best, bringing together world-class dance with enchanting family entertainment.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

2 HOURS 50 MINUTES, INCLUDING

TWO INTERVALS

Envy, conspiracy, love, jealousy, revenge and ultimately, forgiveness come together in this Verdi’s intensely passionate masterpiece.<P>

The political intrigue at the heart of the opera initially aroused the anger of contemporary censors; indeed, Verdi and his librettist were compelled to make alter the setting, moving the action away from the original Sweden to the distant US: Boston.<P>

The great Polish tenor Piotr Beczała returns to the Liceu in one of his most acclaimed roles, singing alongside soprano Ekaterina Metlova. Vincent Lemaire’s staging and Vincent Boussard’s sets reinforce the dark and mysterious atmosphere surrounding the piece, which features lavish costumes by Christian Lacroix. The cast, directed by the true Verdi specialist Renato Palumbo, also features two Verdi leaders: Dolora Zajick and Marco Caria.

Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You! is an original story highlighting Ash & Pikachu’s first meeting and their adventures as they search for the legendary Pokémon Ho-Oh. The iconic pair encounter familiar faces along the way, new characters including Trainers, Verity and Sorrel, and even a mysterious new Mythical Pokémon, Marshadow. Challenges and epic Pokémon battles abound in this unique story about the beginning of one of the most lovable friendships in popular culture.

For fans of the popular Pokémon Trading Card Game, those who purchase tickets for the November 5th and 6th showings will receive a never-before-seen Pokémon TCG card featuring Ash’s Pikachu wearing its Trainer’s hat, as seen in Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You! (while stocks last). Cinemagoers will also receive a QR code (while stocks last) that will unlock an in-game event in the highly anticipated Pokémon Ultra Sun and Pokémon Ultra Moon video games for the Nintendo 3DS family of systems, which release shortly after the movie, on November 17. The QR Code also unlocks Ash’s Pikachu wearing its Trainer’s hat.

Cinema attendees will be treated to a special reel of fun Pokémon content that's never been seen in cinemas. Animated shorts featuring Pikachu, Rowlet, Litten, and Popplio, select episodes of Pokémon Generations and iconic “Who is the Pokémon?” trivia will run as fans settle in to their seats and get ready for the main event, Pokémon the Movie: I Choose You! Attendees will also be treated to a special montage and a look back at previous animated Pokémon movies, set to a newly recorded version of the classic Pokémon theme song, also never seen before in cinema.

Stage Russia HD (Theatre Art Studio): Sergey Zhenovach's adaptation of Nikolai Erdman's comedy centers around a young, unemployed man desperate enough to contemplate ending it all. As soon as he declares his will to die he finds himself surrounded by a variety of characters begging him to kill himself as a gesture for their cause. Flattered by this notoriety  but panicked at the prospect of actually having to go through with it, he must find a way out that somehow leaves his dignity intact. Designer Alexander Borovsky’s walled-up stage with two stories of raggedy doors allows for slapstick chases and gives Zhenovach the opportunity to play entire scenes offstage, freeing it of realistic details and keeping the focus on the characters and their predicaments. Once the production builds up a head of steam, the laughs come fast and furious. The play, originally written in 1928, forms a link in Russian literary history between the satirical mastery of Nikolai Gogol and the post-World War II Theatre of the Absurd.

Baptista struggles to marry off his tempestuous daughter Katharina, a shrew who denies that any man could possibly be her match. However when she meets Petruchio, who is as ill-tempered as she, the two forces of nature ignite an unexpected and explosive encounter.

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Acclaimed choreographer Jean-Christophe Maillot brings out the wit, fast-paced athleticism and vibrancy from the Bolshoi Ballet dancers in Shakespeare’s rowdy comedy. Principals Ekaterina Krysanova and Vladislav Lantratov clash, challenge and eventually give themselves to one another in a wonderfully entertaining production that can only be seen at the Bolshoi!

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Captured live on Jan 24, 2016

Follies is a dazzling musical by Stephen Sondheim (A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Sunday in the Park with George), performed for the first time on the National Theatre’s Olivier stage.  The cast includes Imelda Staunton, who was recently on NT Live screens in Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Tracie Bennett and Janie Dee; and the production will also include a 21-piece orchestra.  It promises to be a visual and musical extravaganza, and we’re delighted to be bringing it to screens.

Take a seat at the strangest dinner party of your life. The servants have absconded; the ragout is all over the floor; there’s a bear in the garden; your fellow guests are rapidly descending into savagery; and most mysteriously of all, no one seems able to leave. British composer Thomas Adès (The Tempest) conducts the American premiere of his latest opera. Co-commissioned by the Met and sung in English, this black comedy, with shades of JG Ballard/Ben Wheatley’s High-Rise, is based on the screenplay of Luis Buñuel’s 1962 surrealist film. The cast is filled with established British names including Sally Matthews, Sophie Bevan, Alice Coote, Christine Rice, Ieystn Davies and John Tomlinson. “Inventive and audacious… a major event” (New York Times).

Widely considered Britain’s most popular artist, David Hockney is a global sensation with exhibitions in London, New York, Paris and beyond, attracting millions of visitors worldwide.

Now entering his 9th decade, Hockney shows absolutely no evidence of slowing down or losing his trademark boldness.<P>

Featuring intimate and in-depth interviews with Hockney, this revealing film focuses on two blockbuster exhibitions held in 2012 and 2016 at the Royal Academy of Art in London.

Director Phil Grabsky secured privileged access to craft this cinematic celebration of a 21st century master of creativity.

Olivier award-winner Eve Best (A Moon for the Misbegotten and Hedda Gabler) and BAFTA-nominated actress Anne Reid (Last Tango in Halifax) star in this new classically staged production of Oscar Wilde’s comedy directed by Dominic Dromgoole, former Artistic Director of Shakespeare’s Globe. The first play from the Classic Spring Theatre Company’s Oscar Wilde Season, A Woman of No Importance will be broadcast live to cinemas from the Vaudeville Theatre in London’s West End.

An earnest young American woman, a louche English lord, and an innocent young chap join a house party of fin de siècle fools and grotesques. Nearby a woman lives, cradling a long-buried secret. First performed in 1893, Oscar Wilde’s marriage of glittering wit and Ibsenite drama satirised the socially conservative world of the Victorian upper-class, creating a vivid new theatrical voice which still resonates today.

As the clock strikes midnight on Christmas Eve, Marie’s wooden nutcracker doll comes to life and transforms into a prince! Soon joined by her other toys that have also come to life, Marie and her prince embark on a dreamy unforgettable adventure.

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A holiday tradition for the whole family,  The Nutcracker sweeps the Bolshoi stage for two hours of enchantment and magic. Along with Tchaikovsky’s cherished score and and some of the Bolshoi’s greatest artists, The Nutcracker remains a treasure not to be missed!

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Captured live on Dec 21, 2014

The young Clara creeps downstairs on Christmas Eve to play with her favourite present – a Nutcracker doll. But the mysterious magician Drosselmeyer is waiting to sweep her off on a magical

adventure. After defeating the Mouse King, the Nutcracker and Clara travel through the Land of Snow to the Kingdom of Sweets, where the Sugar Plum Fairy treats them to a wonderful display of dances. Back home, Clara thinks she must have been dreaming – but doesn’t she recognize Drosselmeyer’s nephew? Peter Wright’s nigh-on definitive production for The Royal Ballet ranks as one of the most enduring and enchanting versions of The Nutcracker. With its festive period setting, dancing snowflakes and enchanting stage magic, Lev Ivanov’s 1892 ballet has become the perfect Christmas entertainment, with Tchaikovsky’s sumptuous, sugar-spun music the most recognizable of all ballet scores. Loosely based on the story by E.T.A. Hoffmann, the ballet opens with a lively Christmas party, its Victorian setting captured in opulent detail by Julia Trevelyan Oman’s designs. Wright’s choreography ingeniously incorporates surviving fragments of the ballet’s original material, including the sublime pas de deux for the Sugar Plum Fairy and her Prince. But in emphasizing the relationship between Clara and the Nutcracker Prince, the production also gains a touching subtext of first love.<P>

LIVE: Tuesday 5 December 2017 [7.15pm]

ENCORE: Sunday 10 December 2017 [2pm]

Two acts, approx. 135 minutes (including one interval)

Rory Kinnear (The Threepenny Opera, Penny Dreadful, Othello) is Marx and Oliver Chris (Twelfth Night, Green Wing) is Engels, in this new comedy written by Richard Bean and Clive Coleman. Broadcast live from The Bridge Theatre, London, the production  is directed by Nicholas Hytner and reunites the creative team behind Broadway and West End hit comedy One Man, Two Guvnors. <P>

1850, and Europe’s most feared terrorist is hiding in Dean Street, Soho. Broke, restless and horny, the thirty-two-year-old revolutionary is a frothing combination of intellectual brilliance, invective, satiric wit, and child-like emotional illiteracy.<P>

Creditors, spies, rival revolutionary factions and prospective seducers of his beautiful wife all circle like vultures. His writing blocked, his marriage dying, his friend Engels in despair at his wasted genius, his only hope is a job on the railway. But there’s still no one in the capital who can show you a better night on the piss than Karl Heinrich Marx.

“Who am I? I’m a poet. What do I do? I write. And how do I live? I live!” – Rodolfo, Act I<P>

No one better described the half-starved, struggling artists of mid-nineteenth century Paris than the writer Henri Murger in Scènes de la Vie de Bohème.<P>

These bohemian artists are ready to burn a manuscript to try to keep warm yet, in an era of triumphant bourgeois materialism, they dream of another existence. Taking up these scenes of Bohemian life, Puccini offers us a heart-breaking love story and some of the most beautiful music in the history of opera, telling the story of the poet Rodolfo and the fragile Mimi.<P>

The staging of this new production has been entrusted to Claus Guth, who sets the drama in a future devoid of hope, in which love and art become the sole means of transcendence.<P>

Conductor Gustavo Dudamel (currently Music & Artistic Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic) leads a fantastic cast, including Sonya Yoncheva, Aida Garifullina, Atalla Ayan, Alessio Arduini and Artur Ruciński.

Set against the backdrop of the French Revolution, ANDREA CHÉNIER is loosely based on the turbulent real life events of the poet of the same name. Along with the servant Carlo Gérard, Chénier falls in love with young aristocrat Maddalena, and will do anything to win over her heart. First performed at the Teatro Alla Scala in 1896, Umberto Giordano’s opera is brought to life by Russian soprano Anna Netrebko and her husband Yusif Eyvazov

Stage Russia HD (Vakhtangov Theatre): Rimas Tuminas' reimagining of Anton Chekhov's tale about broken illusions and dashed hopes is freed from its traditional trappings, leaving behind a battlefield for passions and colliding ambitions, We are given an empty space from which life has departed, a theatre space with grey slips, a plaster of Paris lion – a symbol of Petersburg, perhaps the ancestor who built the house came from there, a workbench made out of rough boards, an old sofa, several chairs of different colors. This "Uncle Vanya" is about what Chekhov’s characters think and what they admit to only at moments of emotional turmoil. They are at times tongue-tied or overly brutal, but their revelations break out of them fervently, desperately  just as a man breaks out of a stuffy room into the open air. A Golden Mask Winner for Best Drama, featuring the inimitable Sergey Makovetskiy as Voynitsky.

The corruption of innocence is at the heart of Verdi’s potent tragedy in David McVicar’s production for The Royal Opera. Rigoletto, court jester to the libertine Duke of Mantua, is cursed by the father of one of the Duke’s victims for his irreverent laughter. When the Duke seduces Rigoletto’s daughter Gilda, it seems the curse is taking effect...David McVicar’s production highlights the cruelty at the heart of the court of Mantua. Richly dressed courtiers engage in orgies and revelries to Verdi’s heady, spirited dances. The opera’s many musical highlights include the ebullient ‘La donna è mobile’, in which the Duke boasts of his disregard for women; Gilda’s exquisite, plangent duets with Rigoletto and the Duke; and the gorgeous Act III quartet that beautifully weaves the voices together as the story quickens to its shattering conclusion. Giuseppe Verdi wrote in 1855 that Rigoletto was his ‘best opera’. He had had to overcome state censorship to stage it – the censors objected to its depiction of an immoral ruler – but he was vindicated by the premiere’s huge success in 1851. Rigoletto was performed 250 times in the next 10 years and has remained one of the most popular of all operas.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

2 HOURS 45 MINUTES, INCLUDING

ONE INTERVAL | SUNG IN ITALIAN

WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES

In Verona, Romeo and Juliet fall madly in love while their respective families, the Montagues and the Capulets, are caught in a bitter rivalry ending in heart-wrenching tragedy…

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Alexei Ratmansky, former artistic director of the Bolshoi Ballet, stages the company’s premiere of his production with dramatic urgency and a fresh re-telling of Shakespeare’s beloved classic. His brilliant and detailed adaptation set to Prokofiev’s romantic and cinematic score, reignites the story of literature’s most celebrated star-crossed lovers like no other classical ballet choreographer today.

EXHIBITION ON SCREEN is thrilled to present one of the most talked about exhibitions of the year. Dedicated to the portrait work of Paul Cézanne, the exhibition opens in Paris before traveling to London and Washington. <P>

One can’t appreciate 20th century art without understanding the significance and genius of Paul Cézanne. Featuring interviews with curators and experts from the National Portrait Gallery London, MoMA New York, National Gallery of Art Washington, and Musée d’Orsay Paris, and correspondence from the artist himself, the film takes audiences beyond the exhibition to the places Cézanne lived and worked and sheds light on an artist who is perhaps the least known of all the impressionists – until now.  

Puccini’s thrilling Tosca is a story of love, terror, the abuse of power, and the unquenchable longing for freedom. When an escaped political prisoner takes refuge in a church, an opera singer and a painter are drawn into a twisting plot that puts them at the mercy of the secret police and its network of torturers and spies. Rivalling the splendour of Franco Zeffirelli’s Napoleonic-era sets and costumes, Sir David McVicar’s ravishing new production offers a splendid backdrop for extraordinary singing. Sonya Yoncheva stars as the titular prima donna, alongside Vittorio Grigolo as her artist lover and Bryn Terfel as the villainous police chief—one of his signature roles. James Levine conducts.

As he arrives in Paris for the first time, the young and naive Armand is utterly captivated after meeting the ravishing and most desirable courtesan Marguerite Gautier. Their encounter gives birth to a passionate yet doomed love…

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Alexandre Dumas fils’s novel comes to life on the Bolshoi stage, with prima Svetlana Zakharova as the ailing Marguerite seeking love and redemption from her life as a courtesan. The Bolshoi brings choreographer John Neumeier’s work of rare beauty and tragic depth to new emotional heights, accompanied by Chopin’s romantic piano score.

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Captured live on Dec 06, 2015

Tosca is one of the great evenings of opera, and from its strident opening chords conjures

up a world of political instability and menace. Jonathan Kent’s production for The Royal Opera

captures the dangerous political turbulence of Rome in 1800. The Chief of Police, Scarpia – one of the most malevolent villains in opera – ruthlessly pursues and tortures enemies of the state. His dark, demonic music contrasts with the expansive melodies of the idealistic lovers, Tosca and

Cavaradossi, who express their passion in sublime arias, including ‘Vissi d’arte’ and ‘E lucevan le stelle’. Giacomo Puccini’s dramatic work was a hit with audiences on its 1900 premiere and it remains one of the most performed of all operas – with its gripping plot and glorious music, it’s easy to see why. A candle-lit church, Scarpia’s gloomy study with its hidden torture chamber and the false optimism of a Roman dawn: this handsome production throws into relief the ruthlessly taut drama, as the tension is wound up towards a fateful conclusion. Puccini’s meticulously researched score is infused with the same authentic detail, from distant cannon fire during the Act I Te Deum to tolling church bells and the sounds of a firing squad

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS, INCLUDING TWO

INTERVALS | SUNG IN ITALIAN

WITH ENGLISH SUBTITLES

The poor country boy Nemorino is in love with Adina, a confident landowner, but she is way out of his league—financially and otherwise. But when he buys a “love potion” from a travelling quack, the results are rather more than he bargained for. Charmingly staged by Bartlett Sher, Donizetti’s beloved masterpiece combines deft comic timing with touching emotional depth. The production stars Matthew Polenzani, who enthralled Met audiences as Nemorino in 2013 with his moving “Una furtiva lagrima.” Rising South African soprano Pretty Yende is the spirited Adina, Davide Luciano makes his Met debut as the arrogant soldier Belcore, and Ildebrando D’Arcangelo is the potion-peddling Doctor Dulcamara. Domingo Hindoyan conducts.

Twelfth Night is a tale of unrequited love – hilarious and heartbreaking. Two twins are separated in a shipwreck, and forced to fend for themselves in a strange land. The first twin, Viola, falls in love with Orsino, who dotes on OIivia, who falls for Viola but is idolised by Malvolio. Enter Sebastian, who is the spitting image of his twin sister... <P>

Christopher Luscombe, Director of the ‘glorious’ (Daily Telegraph) Love’s Labour’s Lost and Much Ado About Nothing (2014 and 2016), returns to the Royal Shakespeare Company to tackle Shakespeare’s greatest comedy, a brilliantly bittersweet account of "the whirligig of time".

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

By Tennessee Williams

Directed by Benedict Andrews

Tennessee Williams’ twentieth century masterpiece Cat on a Hot Tin Roof played a strictly limited season in London’s West End in 2017. Following his smash hit production of A Streetcar Named Desire, Benedict Andrews’ ‘thrilling revival’ (New York Times) stars Sienna Miller alongside, Jack O’Connell and Colm Meaney.

On a steamy night in Mississippi, a Southern family gather at their cotton plantation to celebrate Big Daddy’s birthday. The scorching heat is almost as oppressive as the lies they tell. Brick and Maggie dance round the secrets and sexual tensions that threaten to destroy their marriage. With the future of the family at stake, which version of the truth is real – and which will win out?

"A bold reimagining…innovative and powerfully acted"  

Sunday Times

"A brilliant, lacerating account of the play… unforgettable"  

The Independent

"Miller and O’Connell get to a raw and naked truth"  

The Metro

The world’s most popular opera returns with an exciting young cast in Franco Zeffirelli’s legendary production. Poverty-stricken poet Rodolfo and his artist friends eke out a precarious existence in bohemian Paris, alternately practising their art, laughing, quarrelling, dodging the landlord, and living it up in their local cafe. When Rodolfo meets the delicate Mimì, the pair instantly fall in love. But Mimì is ill, Rodolfo is jealous, and their romance is doomed from the start. Opera superstars Sonya Yoncheva and Michael Fabiano play the heart-breaking couple, singing two sublime Puccini favourites—“Sì, mi chiamano Mimì” and “Che gelida manina.” Zeffirelli’s stupendous onstage recreations of 19th-century Paris are sure to take your breath away.

Charles Gounod’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s timeless tragedy returns to the stage of the Gran Teatre del Liceu after an absence of over three decades.<P>

Co-produced with the Santa Fe Opera, this production is conducted by Josep Pons and directed by Stephen Lawless. The action is moved to the context of the American Civil War (1861-1865), providing clear context for the insurmountable divisions between the Capulets and the Montagues. The lovers live in a classic mortuary, foreshadowing their fatal destiny from the very start of their infatuation.<P>

Hailed by Plácido Domingo as “one of the most exciting opera divas of today and tomorrow”, Aida Garifullina stars as Juliet alongside Saimir Pirgu, who has been described by Opera Today as "one of the world's most important interpreters of lyric tenor roles".

Christopher Wheeldon, Artistic Associate of The Royal Ballet, created his adaptation of Shakespeare’s late great romance The Winter’s Tale for The Royal Ballet in 2014. Building on the success of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, The Winter’s Tale received ecstatic praise at its premiere, acclaimed by critics and audiences alike for its intelligent, distinctive and emotionally powerful story, told through exquisite dance. It is now widely judged to be a modern ballet classic.

The story follows the destruction of a marriage through consuming jealousy, the abandonment of a child and a seemingly hopeless love. Yet, through remorse and regret – and after a seemingly miraculous return to life – the ending is one of forgiveness and reconciliation. With powerful designs by Bob Crowley and atmospheric music by Joby Talbot, The Winter’s Tale is a masterful modern narrative ballet.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS, INCLUDING TWO INTERVALS

Stage Russia HD (Lensoviet Theatre): Yuri Butusov’s pastiche of conflicting styles only touches on the storyline of Shakespeare’s Macbeth, reflecting, instead, both confusion from confronting the myth and the desire to unveil it. It follows a non-linear technique, compiling fragments, jumbling up the characters, having them swap roles, understanding that only by blending together these singular moments can the desired completeness be achieved. The scenes are like flaming auroras, fragments of dreams and visions. The surrealistic action in the style of David Lynch plunges the audience into a state of subtle sensuousness. Macbeth.Kino is a beautiful nightmare that sends shivers down your spine and makes you feel like staying in it for good.

280 minutes (with two 10 minute intermissions included)

Russian with English subtitles

In the era of the French Revolution, Jeanne and her brother Jérôme leave Marseille for Paris in support of the revolutionary effort that is taking over the capital. While fighting for freedom, they both encounter love along the way…<P>

Very few ballets can properly depict the Bolshoi’s overflowing energy and fiery passion as can Alexei Ratmansky’s captivating revival of Vasily Vainonen’s The Flames of Paris. With powerful virtuosity and some of the most stunning pas de deux, the Bolshoi Ballet displays an exuberance almost too enormous for the Moscow stage.

Carmen is the best-known work by French composer Georges Bizet, and one of the most famous operas in the entire art form – numbers such as the Habanera and the Toreador Song have permeated the popular consciousness as little else has. The opera’s heady combination of passion, sensuality and violence initially proved too much for the stage, and it was a critical failure on its

1875 premiere. Bizet died shortly after, and never learned of the spectacular success his Carmen

would achieve: the opera has been performed more than five hundred times at Covent Garden alone. This ever-popular opera is given a fresh point of view in Barrie Kosky’s highly physical production, originally created for Frankfurt Opera. The Australian director is one of the world’s most sought-after opera directors, whose Royal Opera debut with Shostakovich’s The Nose in 2016 was greeted with delight. For Carmen he has devised a far-from-traditional version, incorporating music

written by Bizet for the score but not usually heard, and giving a new voice to the opera’s

endlessly fascinating central character.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS 20 MINUTES, INCLUDING ONE

INTERVAL | SUNG IN FRENCH WITH

ENGLISH SUBTITLES

Against the backdrop of the Hanging Gardens, Semiramide, Queen of Babylon, defies bad omens and supernatural threats in her quest to find a worthy successor to her late husband. But she harbours more than one dark secret, and whoever gains the throne may find that he has lost more than he has won. Based on a story by Voltaire, this rarely performed tragic opera reveals The Barber of Seville composer Giaochino Rossini in a whole new light. The title role—composed for Rossini’s wife, Isabella Colbran—features some of the most demanding vocal music he ever wrote. Angela Meade takes on the challenging vocal fireworks in this revival of a production last seen at the Met 25 years ago.

Perhaps more than any other artist, Van Gogh’s life has long captured the imagination of storytellers. Delving deep into his fascinating and sometimes deeply troubled world comes this definitive, award-winning documentary directed by David Bickerstaff.<P>

Showcasing Van Gogh’s iconic works like never before and featuring exclusive interviews with the curatorial team at the Van Gogh Museum, this EXHIBITION ON SCREEN favourite from Season 2 makes a welcome return to the big screen.

A new production of Oscar Wilde’s social comedy, Lady Windermere’s Fan, directed by award-winning writer, actor and director Kathy Burke, will be broadcast live to cinemas from the Vaudeville Theatre in London’s West End. This is the second play from the Oscar Wilde Season, a year-long celebration of the brilliant Victorian playwright being staged by Classic Spring, a new theatre company led by Dominic Dromgoole, former Artistic Director of Shakespeare’s Globe.

The day of Lady Windermere’s birthday party, and all is perfectly in order. Until her friend Lord Darlington plants a seed of suspicion. Is her husband having an affair? And will the other woman really attend the party? First performed in 1892, Lady Windermere’s Fan explores the ambiguity of upper class morality and the fragile position of women in society in the late Victorian era in one of Wilde’s most popular and witty plays.

Ben Whishaw (The Danish Girl, Skyfall, Hamlet) and Michelle Fairley (Fortitude, Game of Thrones) play Brutus and Cassius, David Calder (The Lost City of Z, The Hatton Garden Job) plays Caesar and David Morrissey (The Missing, Hangmen, The Walking Dead) is Mark Antony. Broadcast live from The Bridge Theatre, London. <P>

Caesar returns in triumph to Rome and the people pour out of their homes to celebrate. Alarmed by the autocrat’s popularity, the educated élite conspire to bring him down. After his assassination, civil war erupts on the streets of the capital. <P>

Nicholas Hytner’s production will thrust the audience into the street party that greets Caesar’s return, the congress that witnesses his murder, the rally that assembles for his funeral and the chaos that explodes in its wake.

Leonard Bernstein was one of the first classical composers in America to achieve both popular and critical acclaim. He was eclectic in his sources – drawing on jazz and modernism, the traditions of Jewish music and the Broadway musical – and many of Bernstein’s scores are remarkably well suited to dance. He was particularly associated with Jerome Robbins, their credits together including Fancy Free and West Side Story. To celebrate the centenary year of the composer’s birth, The Royal Ballet

has united all three of its associate choreographers to celebrate the dynamic range and danceability of Bernstein’s music. The programme includes two world premieres by Resident Choreographer Wayne McGregor and Artistic Associate Christopher Wheeldon, marking each artist’s first foray

into Bernstein. At the heart of the programme is the first revival of Artist in Residence Liam Scarlett’s The Age of Anxiety, created in 2014 to Bernstein’s soul-searching Second Symphony. Both symphony and ballet are inspired by W.H. Auden’s masterful modernist poem, itself written in response to the atmosphere of disillusionment and uncertainty that followed the end of World War II.

<P>APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS, INCLUDING TWO INTERVALS

Goaded by their cynical friend Don Alfonso, soldiers Ferrando and Guglielmo decide to test their fiancées’ fidelity. Pretending to leave with their regiment, they return in disguise and pay court to each other’s lover. Will the young women succumb to the charms of these two handsome ‘foreigners’? A co-production with English National Opera, this clever vision of the battle of the sexes is set in a carnivalesque environment inspired by 1950s Coney Island. The cast features Amanda Majeski and Serena Malfi as the sisters put to the test, with Broadway star Kelli O’Hara as their feisty maid, Ben Bliss and Adam Plachetka as their fiancés, and Christopher Maltman as Don Alfonso. David Robertson conducts Mozart’s delightful score.

Verdi’s life-long love affair with Shakespeare’s works began with Macbeth, a play he considered to be ‘one of the greatest creations of man’. With his librettist, Francesco Maria Piave, Verdi set out to create ‘something out of the ordinary’. Their success is borne out in every bar of a score that sees Verdi at his most theatrical: it bristles with demonic energy. The warrior Macbeth fights on the side of the King of Scotland – but when a coven of witches prophesy that he shall become king himself, a ruthless ambition drives Macbeth and his wife to horrific acts. Murder makes Macbeth king, and intrigue and butchery are the hallmarks of his brief, doomed reign. The witches make another prediction, which also comes true: Macbeth and his lady lose their lives, and justice is restored.

Phyllida Lloyd’s 2002 production for The Royal Opera is richly hued, shot through with black, red and gold. The witches – imagined by designer Anthony Ward as strange, scarlet-turbaned creatures – are ever-present agents of fate. Lloyd depicts the Macbeths’ childlessness as the dark sadness lurking

behind their terrible deeds. The Royal Opera’s production uses Verdi’s 1865 Paris revision of the opera, which includes Lady Macbeth’s riveting aria ‘La luce langue’.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

3 HOURS 20 MINUTES, INCLUDING

ONE INTERVAL | SUNG IN ITALIAN

WITH ENGLISH SURTITLES

When Giselle learns that her beloved Albrecht is promised to another woman, she dies of a broken heart in his arms. While Albrecht grieves, she returns from the dead as a Wili, a vengeful spirit meant to make unfaithful men dance until  death…

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Prima ballerina Svetlana Zakharova personifies this ultimate ballerina role in the classical repertoire, alongside the sensational Sergei Polunin as Albrecht, in this chilling, yet luminous ballet that continues to captivate audiences for over 150 years at the Bolshoi.

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Captured live on Oct 11, 2015

James Levine and Plácido Domingo add yet another chapter to their legendary Met collaboration with this rarely performed Verdi gem, a heart-wrenching tragedy based on Friedrich Schiller’s novel Intrigue and Love. The young maiden Luisa loves Rodolfo, unaware that he is actually the son of the local lord. An unscrupulous rival for her affections tells her father of Rodolfo’s true identity, turning the old man against him. Jealousy, suspicion, and betrayal tear the lovers apart, but Luisa remains loyal to her father to the last. In the first Met performances of the opera in more than ten years, Sonya Yoncheva sings the title role opposite Piotr Beczała as Rodolfo, with Domingo as Luisa’s stern-yet-loving father.

Set in the idyllic 19th century Paris, LA BOHÈME tells the story of a love affair between a poor poet and a seamstress. But they are soon faced by the cruel realities of poverty and ill health which ends up putting their relationship to the test. This production of one of opera’s classic and unforgettable stories is led by a cast of four talented young artists as the lovers.

Stage Russia HD (Stanislavsky ElectroTheatre): Alongside earthly reality another civilization exists parallel to it. Drillalia, the land of the Drill, is inhabited by numerous races, and its people throughout history have traveled to and from Earth, leaving signs of genius behind, while opening up their own world to destruction. We follow the initiation and adventures of a Drillalian Prince - a magician, pagan priest and hero - on a journey through time and space, in an effort to save his people. Boris Yukananov's visionary modern opera, which perfectly weds drama and music, is an exceptional event in the sphere of new theatre in Moscow.

A fairy godmother, a glass slipper, an opulent ball, an enchanted forest, and a Prince Charming who loves her—did all that really happen, or was it just a dream? Long-suffering Cendrillon lives a life of drudgery with her good-natured father and his imperious wife, until fate, romance, and a touch of fairy magic intervene. For the first time ever, Massenet’s sumptuous version of the Cinderella story comes to the Met in this imaginative storybook production directed by Laurent Pelly. Superstar Joyce DiDonato sings the title role, alongside British mezzo-soprano Alice Coote in the trouser role of Prince Charming, Kathleen Kim as the Fairy Godmother, and Stephanie Blythe as the archetypal wicked stepmother.

Manon’s brother Lescaut is offering her to the highest bidder when she meets Des Grieux and falls in love. They elope to Paris, but when Monsieur G.M. offers Manon a life of luxury as his mistress she can’t resist. With the Lescauts’ encouragement Des Grieux cheats at cards in an attempt to win Monsieur G.M.’s fortune. They are caught. Manon is arrested as a prostitute and deported to New

Orleans, followed by Des Grieux. On the run, Manon dies from exhaustion. Kenneth MacMillan’s source for Manon was the 18th-century French novel already adapted for opera by Massenet and Puccini. The premiere was given on 7 March 1974, with the lead roles danced by Antoinette Sibley and Anthony Dowell. The ballet quickly became a staple of The Royal Ballet’s repertory, and a touchstone of adult, dramatic dance. MacMillan found new sympathy with the capricious Manon and her struggle to escape poverty. Designs by his regular collaborator Nicholas Georgiad is reflect this, depicting a world of lavish splendour polluted by miserable destitution. MacMillan’s spectacular ensemble scenes for the whole Company create vivid, complex portraits of the distinct societies of Paris and New Orleans. But it is Manon and Des Grieux’s impassioned pas de deux – recalling the

intensity of MacMillan’s earlier Romeo and Juliet– that drive this tragic story, and make Manon one of MacMillan’s most powerful dramas.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

2 HOURS 35 MINUTES, INCLUDING

TWO INTERVALS

Soprano Rosa Feola takes to the stage in this opera directed by Riccardo Chailly. DON PASQUALE follows an old bachelor who decides to marry and produce an heir to spite his disobedient nephew Ernesto, who wants to marry for love rather than money. But Pasquale’s chosen bride isn’t who she seems and bears her own secret…

After premiering in Season 4 of EXHIBITION ON SCREEN, I, Claude Monet is back by popular demand, revealing the heart and soul of arguably the world’s most loved artist. <P>

Monet’s life is a gripping tale about a man who, behind his sun-dazzled canvases, suffered from feelings of depression, loneliness, even suicide. However, as his art developed and his love of gardening led to the glories of his Giverny garden, his humour, insight and love of life are revealed.  <P>

Told through Monet’s own words and shot on location at the very spots he painted, the film features his most loved paintings in an unforgettable, immersive art experience.

"When I choreograph, it is the very act of creating and observing that connects me most deeply with the natural world, with the brutality and beauty it contains." - Crystal Pite<P>

Three contemporary choreographers come together for a program that leads the Opera’s dancers to a new form of modernity where bodies vibrate with intensity.<P>

Canada’s Crystal Pite returns with The Seasons’ Canon, a dazzling creation that thrilled audiences at the Palais Garnier last season. Spain’s Iván Pérez occupies the stage of the Opera for the first time with a creation for ten male dancers. To conclude the evening, Israel’s Hofesh Shechter, often lauded for his telluric, trance-evoking dances, offers a new version of his piece The Art of Not Looking Back.

LE CORSAIRE follows the swashbuckling adventures of a dashing pirate who journeys across the high seas to save his beloved from the Pasha’s harem with danger looming at every turn. With lavish sets and costumes, the choreography mirrors Russian ballet master Maris Petipa’s revival from 19th century St. Petersburg. Full of action, passion and a romantic twist form the heart of this unmissable ballet.

“Living power is unbearable for the people. They can love only the dead.” - Boris, Boris Godounov, Alexandre Pushkin<P>

In 1824, when Pushkin turned to Boris Godounov for his first historical drama, he knew well the colossus he was tackling. Armed with his reading of Shakespeare, Pushkin retold the epic history of the dazzling reign of the Tzar of Russia (1598-1605). Indeed, elements of Macbeth appear throughout this political fable, in which an imposter with ambitions for the throne haunts Boris, pretending to return as the child that Boris had once killed in order to seize power. Adapting this epic poem, Mussorgsky composed a meditation on the solitude of power, a populist drama in which the real protagonist is the Russian people with its burden of eternal suffering.<P>

Ivo Van Hove is no stranger to grand political frescos, having previously staged Tragédies Romaines and Kings of War, both based on plays by Shakespeare. This is his first production for the Paris Opera.<P>

The production stars Ildar Abdrazakov, “one of the most sought-after young basses in the operatic world” (Vanity Fair) and “one of the most exciting Russian singers to emerge on the international scene in the past decade” (Opera News).

Swanhilda notices her fiancee Franz is infatuated with the beautiful Coppélia who sits reading on her balcony each day. Nearly breaking up the two sweethearts, Coppelia is not what she seems and Swanhilda decides to teach Franz a lesson…

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The Bolshoi’s unique version of Coppélia exhibits a fascinating reconstruction of the original 19th century choreography of this ebullient comedy involving a feisty heroine, a boyish fiancee with a wandering eye, and an old dollmaker. The company’s stunning corps de ballet shines in the divertissements and famous  “dance of the hours,” and its principals abound in youthful energy and irresistible humor in this effervescent production.

Swan Lake has had a special role in the repertory of The Royal Ballet since 1934. This Season The Royal Ballet creates a new production with additional choreography by Artist in Residence Liam Scarlett. While remaining faithful to the Petipa-Ivanov text, Scarlett will bring fresh eyes to the staging of this classic ballet, in collaboration with his long-term designer John Macfarlane. Prince Siegfried chances upon a flock of swans while out hunting. When one of the swans turns into a beautiful woman, Odette, he is enraptured. But she is under a spell that holds her captive, allowing her to regain her human form only at night. Swan Lake was Tchaikovsky’s first ballet score. Given its status today as arguably the best loved and most admired of all classical ballets, it is perhaps surprising that at its premiere in 1877 Swan Lake was poorly received. It is thanks to the 1895 production by Marius Petipa and Lev Ivanov that Swan Lake has become part of not only ballet

consciousness but also wider popular culture. That success is secured not only by the sublime, symphonic sweep of Tchaikovsky’s score, but also by the striking choreographic contrasts between Petipa’s royal palace scenes and the lyric lakeside scenes created by Ivanov.

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APPROXIMATE RUNNING TIME:

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“I may well be mature of age, but I’m still well preserved, and as far as strength and sprightliness go, I’ve enough, and some to spare.” – Don Pasquale, Don Pasquale, Act I, Scene III<P>

“Foolish indeed is he who marries in old age.” Thus ends Don Pasquale: with a wise dictum not lacking in irony that sums up the disappointments of its hero, a rich bachelor keen to marry, who is deceived by his nephew Ernesto and his young bride-to-be Norina. First performed in Paris in 1843, at the turning point of several eras, Don Pasquale, a composite and varied work, is the apotheosis of opera buffa. Performed for the first time at the Paris Opera, the production has been entrusted to Italian director, Damiano Michieletto, who transports us directly to the sincerity and dramatic splendor at the heart of a seemingly light‑hearted work.<P>

Bass Michele Pertusi sings the title role, joined by tenor Lawrence Brownlee, whose “instrument of great beauty and expression” is “perfectly suited” to the great operas of Donizetti (NPR Music). Nadine Sierra, winner of the 2017 Richard Tucker Award, sings as the flirtatious and mischievous Norina.

A gripping drama based on the short novel by Herman Melville, BILLY BUDD follows a young sailor who finds himself serving under the repressive regime of master-at-arms John Claggart in the Royal Navy. Unable to bear the goodness that Billy radiates, Claggert becomes determined to destroy him, leading Billy to take harsh actions against his superior. First performed at the Royal Opera House in 1951, this is a fresh and innovative contemporary opera.