Name: La pietra del paragone
Start: 2007-03-25T00:00:00.000Z
End: 2007-04-16T00:00:00.000Z
Location: Teatro Real

Organization

Singer

Soprano

Patrizia Biccirè

Donna Fulvia

Laura Brioli

La baronesa Aspasia

Contralto

Marie-Ange Todorovitch

La marquesa Clarice

Tenor

Raúl Giménez

Il Cavalier Giocondo

Bass

Marco Vinco

Count Asdrubale

Paolo Bordogna

Pacuvio

Pietro Spagnoli

Macrobio

Conductor

Alberto Zedda

Stage director

Pier Luigi Pizzi

Set designer

Costume designer

Lighting designer

Sergio Rossi

Chorus master

Jordi Casas Bayer

Teatro Real de Madrid

Others

Coro Intermezzo

Orchestra

Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid

La pietra del paragone -  (The Touchstone)

Madrid

Spain

Teatro Real

Conductor Alberto Zedda and Stage Director Pier Luigi Pizzi joined forces to present a witty production of La pietra del paragone, a romantic comedy of errors by Gioachino Rossini (1792-1868) first performed at the Teatro Real on 25 March 2007.

La pietra del paragone (The Touchstone), first performed on 26 November 1812 at the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, is one of the most enjoyable of Gioachino Rossini’s comedies. This melodramma giocoso narrates a series of amorous intrigues involving a group of women who are subjected to a test by a Count who hopes to find a worthy candidate.

Far from the tradition productions in period costume, Pier Luigi Pizzi imagines this Touchstone in a modern villa "Beverly Hills style"! Sheltered by large verandas, the Count Asdrubale wanders in his luxurious bathrobe and watch his guests enjoy his gorgious garden, notably provided with real swimming-pool! With sport chic clothes and models dressed in bikinis, the stage is very close to look like the yacht of a celebrity...

And this apparent modernity is totally justified by the universality of the subject of the opera itself! The count Asdrubale (Marco Vinco), a thirty year-old rich man who has yet not found a wife, has got serious doubts: how can he be sure that Donna Fulvia (Patrizia Biccirè), La Baronessa Aspasia (Laura Brioli) and La Marchesa Clarice (Marie-Ange Todorovitch), three delicious women who court him, desire him for what he really is and not only for his money? Asdrubale makes a Machiavellian project in order to find out who is the less sincere of all women!

La pietra del paragone

Public

The Touchstone

Approved

Production booklet

Further reading