Don Giovanni takes up residence in Drottningholm Court Theatre

Rehearsals have now begun for Don Giovanni ahead of the premiere on 13 August. The production is part of the Drottningholms Slottsteater’s 250th anniversary celebrations and is by the same French super-team that produced last-year’s highly acclaimed interpretation of The Marriage of Figaro at this historical opera house. Star conductor Marc Minkowski is set to direct this musical work with the Drottningholm Theatre Orchestra and some of the world’s finest singers.

Starting last year and for the next two years, Drottningholms Slottsteateris staging Mozart’s three Da Ponte operas – Figaros bröllop, Don Giovanni and Così fan tutte. The theatre will also be visited for these three years by the French artistic team of Marc Minkowski (conductor), Ivan Alexandre (director) and Antoine Fontaine (stage and costume designer).

“After last year’s success, I’m convinced that we’ll be putting on an equally memorable show this year too,” says theatre director Sofi Lerström. “This is opera at its most sublime performed in a Swedish world-heritage theatre. It promises to be an unforgettable experience.”

The entire trilogy is so designed as to be easily transported to other opera houses with one and the same stage set based on a playful variation on the “theatre within a theatre” theme. Drottningholms Slottsteater’s Don Giovanni has already been booked for guest performances at Paris’s Opéra Royal de Versailles next spring - a collaboration that began last January when The Marriage of Figaro enjoyed a run of three sold-out performances.

The same characters return

Don Giovanni is one of Mozart’s most beloved operas. Its plot centres on the philanderer Don Juan, who in the Drottningholms Slottsteater’s interpretation is the same character as appears in the other two operas, first as the young libertine Cherubino in The Marriage of Figaro and then as the aged Don Alfonso in Così fan tutte.

“We’re also planning to stage all three operas in succession for the diehard Mozart fans,” says Ms Lerström.

Conductor Marc Minkowski is the founder of Les Musiciens du Louvre and conducts the orchestra regularly at different European opera houses. Director Ivan Alexandrehas several hit productions under his belt and Antoine Fontaine, who is in charge of the stage and costume designs, has previously worked on films such as Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette and Eric Rohmer’s L’Anglaise et le Duc.

The part of Don Giovanni is sung by French baritone Jean-Sébastien Bou. He is joined by Krzysztof Baczyk (Poland) as Il Commendatore/Masetto, Ana Maria Labin (Romania) as Donna Anna, Stanislas de Barbeyrac (France) as Don Ottavio, Marie-Adeline Henry (France) as Donna Elvira, Robert Gleadow (Canada) as Leporello, and Chiara Skerath (Switzerland/Belgium) as Zerlina.

Don Giovanni
Premiere 13 August. Other performance dates: 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25 and 27 August.
Tickets available online from Ticketmaster.se

For further information or interviews, please contact: Elin West, press Drottningholms Slottsteater, 0733 50 26 25, elin.west@dtm.se

Press photographs and more details can be found at: www.mynewsdesk.com/se/drottningholms-slottsteater