100 Great Operas and Their Stories: Act-By-Act Synopses (62 page)

We cannot credit all this Parisian
brouhaha
with the comedy’s long life, for the whims of operatic fashion brushed it right off the stage for a generation or two in the nineteenth century. But its charm and vitality caused it to be revived in the 1860’s, since when it has retained its position as the earliest opera regularly revived by practically every opera-producing group in the world, from college workshops to the Metropolitan and other august museums.

INTERMEZZO I

Uberto, a comfortably off Neapolitan bachelor, has two servants, a pretty girl named Serpina and a mute named Vespone. He complains vigorously of the girl’s failure to bring him his morning chocolate so that he can go out; and when they come in, he tries reading a lecture to both his servants on their deliberate inattention. But Serpina will have none of his lip. She gives him back everything she gets. The chocolate hasn’t been prepared; he’ll just have to do without it. This leads to Uberto’s first aria
(Sempre in contrasti
—“Always at cross-purposes”), in which he continues to complain but in which he already shows some weaknesses of which Serpina is quick to take advantage. She refuses to let him go out, even threatening to lock the door; and when he complains that she is giving him a headache, she delivers herself of an aria
(Stizzoso, mio stizzoso
—“My own fuss-budget”) in which she advises him to take her advice. Thereupon Uberto instructs Vespone to go find him a wife just to spite Serpina. A wife, says she, is just what he needs; and who could be a better one than herself? And the first half of the opera ends with a duet in which Serpina assures him that he really means to marry his beautiful and graceful servant even though he says he won’t, while Uberto insists that she is perfectly mad to think it.

INTERMEZZO II

Presumably a short while after, Serpina brings Vespone into the room, dressed as a soldier and wearing a set of horrendous false whiskers. When Uberto enters, she hides her coconspirator outside the door and proceeds to tell her master that as he refuses to marry her and as she must look after her own interests, she has engaged herself to another. His name, she says, is Captain Tempesta, and he has a frightful temper. This softens Uberto somewhat; and when she sings him a sentimental tune about how one day he shall remember her fondly (
A Serpina penserte)
, he begins to feel downright sentimental.
He agrees to meet this frightening military man; and while she is gone to fetch him, he admits to the audience that he is more in two minds about this matter than he would like to admit
(Son imbrogliato to
già). Vespone, thoroughly instructed, plays his part beautifully. He fumes all over the place without ever uttering a word, and lets Uberto know, through Serpina, that he demands a dowry of four thousand crowns. If he doesn’t get it, he refuses to marry the girl; and, furthermore, Uberto must marry her. When Vespone makes threatening gestures and begins to attack Uberto, the master finally gives in and does what he obviously wanted to do all along: he offers his hand both literally and figuratively. Thereupon Vespone doffs his disguise, but Uberto cannot be angry at him very long. Instead, he joins his fiancée in a darling duet about their delighted hearts (which, they say, beat respectively
tippitì, tippitì
and
tappatà, tappatà)
and which ends with two most elegant and eloquent lines:

Serpina:
Oh, caro, caro, caro!
(Oh darling, darling, darling!)

Uberto:
Oh gioia, gioia, gioia!
(Oh joy, joy, joy!)

^*
The only genuine
opera seria
described in this volume is Handel’s
Julius Caesar
(see p. 236).

^†
For a description of a modern
intermezzo
, see
The Secret of Suzanne
,
this page
.

SIMON BOCCANEGRA

Opera in prologue and three acts by Giuseppe
Verdi with libretto in Italian by Francesco
Maria Piave, based on a play by Antonio García
Gutiérrez

Time: 1339
to 1363

Place: Genoa

First performance at Venice, March 12, 1857

    Except for a few years during the 1930’s, when Lawrence Tibbett starred in the role with a dramatic sense all his own,
Simon Boccanegra
has never captured the imagination and affection of a large public—either here or abroad. It was a comparative failure in its early years, and the composer was not only disappointed but also puzzled. By 1881 he had established a fine relationship with the composer-librettist Arrigo Boito, who had collaborated with brilliant skill and taste on
Otello
, and Verdi turned to him to revise a pretty murky and static libretto. Boito did his best (which, in this case, was not too good); Verdi did far better. The revised version—the only one performed nowadays and the one described below—includes some of Verdi’s most eloquent pages. Even so, the opera remains much more admired by the critics than loved
by the public. Every once in a while an opera company will revive it for the benefit of a star baritone and the opportunity to exhibit some rich scenery. The critics praise it; the public stays away; the baritone stars in something else; and the scenery goes back to the warehouse for another few years.

PROLOGUE

The rather long prologue takes place in a public square of Genoa of the early fourteenth or fifteenth century. (The libretto says early fifteenth century, but the historical election of Simon Boccanegra as first Doge of Genoa took place in 1339.) Genoa was, at the time, a republic, and the opera begins with the professional dealings of a couple of politicians named Paolo and Pietro. They represent the democratic, or Ghibelline, faction, and they discuss who shall be elected the new Doge—that is, the head of the state. Quickly they agree that it shall be Simon Boccanegra. He is, at the moment, a popular and highly respectable freebooter, who has rid the sea around Genoa of non-European pirates. Simon himself enters at this moment, claims he does not choose to run, but is quickly persuaded to change his mind by Paolo. For Simon wishes to marry Maria, with whom he has had a clandestine love affair—and Maria is the daughter of the nobleman Jacopo Fiesco. Should Simon be elected Doge, he would have the rank of a prince, and Fiesco could not deny his daughter to him.

When Simon has consented, the two conspirators summon a group of voters around them. Their political arguments are rather personal, but nonetheless effective. They argue against Fiesco-who would be Simon’s rival of the Guelph party-by claiming that he keeps a beautiful woman mysteriously locked up as a prisoner in his palace. This persuades the populace that Simon will make the best Doge, and they depart, their minds made up. Now, Fiesco, however much a nobleman and a Guelph, is not a villain. The woman he is supposed to be keeping locked up is really his daughter, Maria, the beloved of Simon, and she has just died. In the best-known aria of the
opera
(Il lacerato spirito)
, Fiesco speaks of his sorrow as an off-stage chorus sings a
miserere
.

Simon, who is the father of Maria’s child, begs for the friendship and forgiveness of Fiesco, even offering him his life, by baring his chest. But the patrician Fiesco refuses to be an assassin, and he promises forgiveness only if Simon will turn over to him his grandchild. This, Simon explains, he cannot do. For some time ago the woman to whom the child had been entrusted was found dead, and the child had disappeared. And so Fiesco—without telling Simon that Maria has just died—coldly turns on his heel and leaves his political rival. Simon, however, enters the Fiesco palace, and a minute later comes out again. He has come across the dead body of his beloved Maria!

And at that moment the populace comes into the square to hail their newly elected Doge. As the prologue ends, the crowd cries
Viva Simon!
to the brokenhearted man.

ACT I

Scene 1
Twenty-four years have now passed. Simon Boccanegra is still Doge of Genoa, and his long-lost daughter lives with his old enemy, Fiesco, her grandfather. However, neither the grandfather, the father, nor the girl herself is aware of her true identity, and she goes under the name of Amelia. When the act begins, she is awaiting her lover, Gabriele Adorno, a young nobleman of the party opposed to Simon. She looks out over the sea at dawn, and she sings a lovely aria as she waits for Gabriele. At its end his voice is heard off-stage, singing a love song in the distance. Ecstatically they embrace. But there is a shadow between them, for Amelia does not approve of Gabriele’s plotting with her guardian. As they speak together, they are interrupted by Pietro, who announces the imminent arrival of the Doge himself. Amelia hastily explains that the Doge seeks her hand for one of his favorites, and she begs Gabriele to arrange for their immediate marriage. Before the Doge enters, old Fiesco (who now, to hide his identity, goes under the name of Andrea) tells Gabriele that Amelia
comes of humble stock. This makes no difference to the ardent lover, and so her guardian blesses the union in a duet that strikes a fine religious tone.

Now the Doge enters. The purpose of his visit is to secure Amelia’s hand for Paolo, the man who had helped him become Doge and who is now a chief counselor. But in the course of their long and touching duet he learns of her history, and it suddenly becomes obvious to both of them that she is really his long-lost daughter. Their secret must, for the time being, be kept. The Doge decides that Paolo must not have Amelia as she hates him and loves someone else. But as yet Simon does not know that the accepted lover is his bitter enemy, Gabriele Adorno.

Scene 2
A number of things have happened between the scenes. First, Paolo, Simon’s villainous counselor, has heard that Simon no longer backs him in his suit for Amelia’s hand. Second, he has made an unsuccessful effort to have his henchmen kidnap the girl. And third, the attempt has been foiled by Amelia’s lover, Gabriele, who believes that Simon instigated the plot.

As the act opens, Simon is presiding over a meeting of his council, giving sage advice about maintaining peace. Suddenly there is an uproar outside. The people are angered over the attempt to abduct Amelia, and they mistakenly shout, “Death to the Doge!” Simon takes the whole situation in at once. With a scornful majesty he rises over everything, and turns them to his side. But Gabriele rushes to attack Simon with a dagger. Amelia throws herself between the men, and she indicates clearly, without mentioning his name, that Paolo was the villain behind the abduction. A wonderful sextet, with chorus, develops, as everyone expresses his own emotions in connection with this rather complicated situation. At its end Simon turns to Paolo. He knows that Paolo is the unadmitted guilty one, and he tells him that—as guardian of the people’s honor—he must curse the man who committed the crime. Horrified, Paolo is forced to curse himself:
Sia maledetto
. And as the act closes, the whole assemblage repeats the curse in whispers:
Sia maledetto!

ACT II

At the beginning of Act II, Paolo swears vengeance on Doge Simon and prepares a cup of poison for him. Then he orders the two prisoners, Fiesco and Gabriele, to be brought before him. First he attempts to persuade Fiesco to murder Simon in his sleep. But the old aristocrat again refuses to stoop to assassination. Next, Paolo turns to the young lover, Gabriele. He tells him that Simon has wicked designs on his beloved Amelia and urges
him
to murder the Doge. Left alone, Gabriele gives vent to his rage-and then, in a lovely melody, begs heaven to restore Amelia to his breast.

Amelia now enters the chamber of the palace where this scene takes place, and in a fine duet begs him to respect the Doge and her own innocent love for him. The entrance of the Doge interrupts their interview, and the young man quickly leaves. In the duet that follows, Simon learns that his daughter’s beloved is his enemy, Gabriele. Greatly moved, he promises pardon if Gabriele himself will repent.

And now, the tired Boccanegra sits wearily down, thinks of his troubles—and drinks the poisoned cup that Paolo had left for him. He falls asleep, and Gabriele rushes forth to slay him. But Amelia throws herself between them just in time, and it is only now that Gabriele learns that Simon is Amelia’s father—and that he is greathearted enough to pardon the enemy in his power. Outside, the angry shouts of Simon’s enemies are heard. He urges Gabriele to join his friends on the other side, but the young man cries that he will never again fight Simon. Side by side, they join the battle.

ACT III

The Doge and young Gabriele have been victorious in their battle against the Guelph aristocrats, and Paolo, who had turned traitor to Simon, is brought into the ducal palace, condemned to be hanged. Before he is led off, he tells old Fiesco that he has poisoned the Doge; and then, to make his own
end doubly bitter, he hears, off-stage, the wedding chorus that joins Amelia and Gabriele. Simon—now sick unto death—is led in, preceded by trumpeters. The two old enemies, Fiesco and Boccanegra, are left alone. And as Fiesco learns that Amelia is the long-lost daughter of his own Maria, the two are finally united in friendship.