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With South African soprano Pretty Yende as Violetta, American tenor Jonathan Tetelman as Alfredo, and Italian baritone Simone Piazolla as Giorgio Germont, all three making their company debuts, this new production of Verdi’s La Traviata capped off an exciting Fall season of San Francisco Opera’s Centennial year. Not only was the singing of the three principals in La Traviata sensational, the new production by director Shawna Lucey, the first to be built by the Company in 35 years, was impeccably designed and executed. Add in the acutely sensitive conducting of Music Director Eun Sun Kim and you have a La Traviata for the ages. 

Alexander Dumas fils’ 1848 novel La Dame aux Camélias, which formed the basis of Verdi’s La Traviata, recounted the brief but spectacular life of the famed Parisian courtesan Marie Duplessis. 

Rising from poverty in rural France and an abusive father who nearly beat her mother to death, 

Marie Duplessis found herself alone in Paris at age 11 or 12. As stage director Shawna Lucey writes in the program for La Traviata, Marie Duplessis not only taught herself to read and write but also worked her way up the informal ladder from grisette to full-blown sex-worker as a society courtesan hosting the most sophisticated Parisian salons. Marie Duplessis died in 1847, presumably of tuberculosis, at the age of 23. 

Giuseppe Verdi, who himself was living with a woman, Giuseppina Strepponi, who had formerly been the mistress of a well-known theatre impressario and was the mother of two illegitimate children, had personally experienced the opprobrium of ‘proper’ society over his personal life. Thus he was drawn to the story of Marie Duplessis; and in writing La Traviata with a libretto by Francesco Maria Piave, Verdi intended that his opera be set in the contemporary Paris of the 1840s. Writing to a friend, Verdi described La Dame auc Camélias as “a subject for our time.” However, the administration of Venice’s Teatro la Fenice, where La Traviata premiered in 1853, insisted on setting the opera in the distant past rather than in the contemporary social milieu Verdi wanted. Thus, they attempted to weaken the implied criticism of the more scandalous and yet hypocritical aspects of this story. It wasn’t until the 1880s that Verdi’s wishes for a contemporary setting of La Traviata were respected. 

Act I of La Traviata opens in the salon of Violetta Valéry where party-goers frivolously cavort until Alfredo draws Violetta aside and issues his impassioned declaration of love. Initially, Violetta scoffs at Alfredo’s belief in love. But a bit later, when alone after her guests have left and she hears Alfredo’s voice through her open window extolling the mysterious beauty of love, Violetta has second thoughts. She sings “Ah, fors’ è lui”/“Ah, perhaps he’s the one” who can bring love into her frivolous life. However, in the caballetta, she rejects this thought as “Folia!” and launches into Sempre libera, declaring her resolve to go on leading a life of idle pleasures. As Violetta, Pretty Yende amply displayed the gorgeous tone and sensational high notes that have brought her international fame. Likewise, tenor Jonathan Tetelman as Alfredo displayed the vocal gifts, power and resonant tone, that have made him a rising star in the operatic world. 

In Act II the plot thickens. Violetta and Alfredo are now living together happily in a country house rented by Violetta. But when Alfredo discovers that Violetta is secretly selling off her valuables to pay for the rent, Alfredo vows to take over paying their costs. He immediately goes off to Paris to arrange his finances. During Alfredo’s brief absence, his father, Giorgio Germont, arrives and confronts Violetta with news that Alfredo’s liaison with a noted courtesan is bringing shame to his family and risks ruining his sister’s engagement to the young man she loves. 

Germont begs and cajoles Violetta to renounce her liaison with Alfredo and leave him. When Violetta insists that her love for Alfredo is real and the most important thing in her life., Germont begins to perceive the sincerity and depth of character in Violetta. Nonetheless, he cruelly insists that Violetta leave Alfredo. In the role of Giorgio Germont, Italian baritone Simone Piazzola sang with dazzling intensity of tone and true depth of feeling, even as he cruelly continues to insist on Violetta’s sacrifice of her love for Alfredo. Ultimately, amidst her tears, Violetta agrees to Germont’s demands. She hastily writes a note to Alfredo informing him that she is returning to her former lover Baron Douphal, and she leaves for Paris. No sooner is this note delivered to Alfredo than his father returns to comfort his son. In the aria Di Provenza al mar, Simone Piazzola did his ravishing vocal best to comfort and persuade Alfredo to accept the loss of Violetta. But Alfredo will have none of it and abruptly leaves for Paris to seek revenge on Violetta. 

Act II, Scene II takes place at a Parisian party hosted by Violetta’s friend Flora. Male members of the Opera Chorus sing of the love-life of Spanish matadors while four female dancers wearing s version of the matador’s “suit of lights” perform a dance imitating the matador’s passes in the bullring. All this gaiety is splendidly executed in this production. The mood quickly darkens as Alfredo arrives soon followed by Violetta with Baron Douphal. Alfredo and Baron Douphal butt heads and display their mutual animosity and contempt. When the party-goers leave the room for dinner, Viioletta tries to calm Alfredo and assuage his jealousy. But Alfredo only insults Violetta by throwing money at her in repayment, he says, for her expenses during their love idyll in the country.. Germont, who has followed his son to Paris, arrives in time to witness Alfredo’s insult to Violetta and reproaches his son for this act. In an implausible bit of staging, Shawna Lucey has nearly every female at this party histrionically break off affectionate relations with their lovers in an expression of female solidarity with Violetta. This directorial conceit may be justified on feminist terms, but it remains highly implausible. Meanwhile, Baron Douphal is indignant and challenges Alfredo to a duel, which challenge Alfredo accepts. 

Act III opens with Violetta now deathly ill, waiting in vain for Germont and Alfredo to visit her as Germont has promised, assuring her that he has told Alfredo of her sacrifice. Father and son have temporarily left the country after Alfredo injured Baron Douphal in their duel. Violetta’s physician tries to offer her hope though he confides to Annina, Violett’s attendant, that Violetta has not long to live. Suddenly, Alfredo arrives, soon followed by his father. Violetta and Alfredo declare their eternal love, and Alfredo launches into the song Parigi o cara offering a vision of the imminent happiness and health that await them in leaving Paris for the country. Interestingly, Jonathan Tetelman sings the first verse of this song mezza voce, and Violetta in turn takes up the tune by singing it piano due to her weak state. Then Alfredo reprises it by singing fortissimo, as if he’s trying to convince himself as well as Violetta of a future he no doubt realises is illusory. Suddenly, Violetta has a momentary absence of pain and thinks maybe she will live. But she collapses in Alfredo’s arms and dies, as the opera ends. 

This production of La Traviata promises to be a keeper. The Company considers it as a Legacy Production they intend to recycle many times in future. Let us just hope that in future offerings of La Traviata their casting includes such wonderful singers as Pretty Yende, Jonathan Tetelman, and Simone Piazolla. This may be a large challenge, but if they manage to bring it off, they will have succeeded beyond alll expectations.