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© Ruth Tromboukis, Sandra Kastl
Fedora
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Fedora
Umberto Giordano [1867 – 1948]
Opera in three acts
with a libretto by Arturo Colautti, based on Victorien Sardou's play ‘Fédora’
First performed at the Teatro Lirico in Milan on 17 November 1898
First performed at the Frankfurt Opera on 3 April 2022
First performed at the Deutsche Oper Berlin on 27 November 2025
1 hr 45 mins / no interval
In Italian with German and English surtitles
45 minutes before beginning: Introduction (in German language)
About the performance
Umberto Giordano’s FEDORA swings between whodunnit and the world of political intrigue, at once a tragic love story and a riveting psychogram. The opera was based on the play of the same name by Victorien Sardou, a French playwright who had already provided the source material for Puccini’s TOSCA. The triumphant world premiere of FEDORA in 1898 at the Tetro Lirico in Milan went down in history for featuring the break-out performance of the legendary tenor Enrico Caruso, who established its best-known aria, “Amor ti vieta”, in the collective memory of the world’s operagoers. That first production went on to huge international acclaim, touring Vienna, Paris, Hamburg and the New York MET. Giordano’s best received work after ANDREA CHÉNIER, FEDORA continues to thrill audiences with its musical richness and iconic melodies as it goes about depicting a fin-de-siécle elite whose private issues become entangled with political wheeling and dealing.
Princess Fedora Romazov is all a-flutter on the eve of her marriage to Count Vladimir Andrejevich, who is suddenly killed in an exchange of pistol fire. Fedora follows the presumed assassin and Russian exile, Count Ipanov, to Paris with a view to having him arrested, but Ipanov confesses the deed and declares his love for her. He had caught his own wife in the act of adultery with Fedora’s fiancé, who had then fired on Ipanov, which led to him killing the two-timer in self-defence. This revelation comes too late for him and Fedora, as the Russian police have already acted on her information and taken measures against Ipanov’s family. The lovers learn of this at their refuge in the Swiss Alps. A remorseful Fedora sees suicide as her only way out.
Synopsis
Act 1
St. Petersburg, 1881. A winter's night in the palace of Count Vladimir Andrejevich
Princess Fedora, who is to marry Count Vladimir Andrejevich the following day, arrives and sings of her love for him ("Quanti fior ... Ed ecco il suo ritratto"), unaware that the dissolute Vladimir has betrayed her with another woman. The sound of sleigh-bells is heard and Vladimir is brought in, mortally wounded. Doctors and a priest are summoned, and the servants are questioned (Dimitri: "Signore, alle otto e mezzo"; Cirillo: "Egli mi disse"). Fedora swears on the jeweled Byzantine cross she is wearing (aria: "Dite coragio ... Su questa santa Croce") that Andrejevich's death will be avenged. It is proposed that Count Loris Ipanov, a suspected Nihilist sympathizer, was probably the assassin. De Siriex (a diplomat) and Gretch (a police inspector) plan an investigation.
Act 2
Paris
Fedora has followed Ipanov to Paris to avenge Vladimir's death. There is a reception at Fedora's house, where the Countess Olga Sukarev introduces the virtuoso Polish pianist Boleslao Lazinski. De Siriex sings about Russian women ("La donna russa è femmina due volte"); Olga counters with an aria comparing Parisian gentlemen with the wine of the widow Veuve Clicquot ("Eccone un altro più somigliante ancor"). Ipanov arrives and declares his love for Fedora ("Amor ti vieta"). While Lazinski plays for the party-goers, Fedora tells Ipanov that she is returning to Russia the following day. He is desperate because he has been exiled from Russia and cannot follow her; he confesses that he killed Vladimir. Fedora asks him to return after the reception is over to tell her the whole story. When she is alone, Fedora writes a letter to the chief of the Imperial Police in Russia accusing Ipanov of Vladimir's murder. Ipanov returns and explains that he killed Vladimir because Vladimir and Ipanov's wife Wanda were lovers. Ipanov had discovered them together. Vladimir shot at Ipanov and wounded him. Ipanov returned fire, killing Vladimir. Fedora realizes that she has fallen in love with Ipanov and that he killed not for political ends, but to defend himself and his honor. They embrace and she convinces him to spend the night with her.
Act 3
The Bernese Oberland in Switzerland
Ipanov and Fedora are now lovers (his brief aria: "Te sola io guardo") and living in her villa. With them is her friend, Olga, who sings an aria about bicycling ("Se amor ti allena", sometimes omitted). De Siriex arrives. He teases Olga about her previous lover Lazinski ("Fatevi cor, Contessa!") and invites her on a bicycle ride. He tells Fedora that as a result of the letter she wrote to the police chief, Ipanov's brother Valeriano was arrested for his role in the plot to murder Vladimir and imprisoned in a fortress on the Neva river. One night the river flooded and Valeriano drowned. When Ipanov's mother heard the news, she collapsed and died. Fedora is anguished – she has caused two deaths ("Dio di giustizia"). Ipanov receives a letter from a friend in Russia informing him of his mother's and brother's deaths and that the cause was a woman living in Paris who had written a letter denouncing him to the police. Fedora confesses to writing the letter and begs Ipanov's forgiveness. When he initially refuses and curses her, Fedora swallows poison which she keeps hidden in the cross she always wears. Ipanov begs the doctor to save her but it is too late. Fedora dies in Ipanov's arms.
Program and cast
conductor: John Fiore
director: Christof Loy
Stage design, Costume: Herbert Murauer
Light design: Olaf Winter
Video: Velourfilm AB
Chorus Master: Jeremy Bines
Dramaturgy: Konstantin Parnian
La Principessa Fedora Romazov: Vida Miknevičiūtė
La Contessa Olga Sukarev: Julia Muzychenko
Il Conte Loris Ipanov: Jonathan Tetelman, Rodrigo Porras Garulo (07.12.2025 | 10.12.2025)
De Siriex, diplomatico: Navasard Hakobyan
Dimitri, ragazzo: Arianna Manganello
Desiré, cameriere: Matthew Peña
Il Barone Rouvel: Michael Dimovski
Cirillo, cocchiere: Artur Garbas
Borov, medico: Volodymyr Morozov
Grech, ufficiale di Polizia: Tobias Kehrer
Lorek, chirurgo: Michael Bachtadze
Lazinski, pianista: Chris Reynolds
Un piccolo Savoiardo: Solist*innen des Kinderchores der Deutschen Oper Berlin
Chorus: Chor der Deutschen Oper Berlin
Orchestra: Orchester der Deutschen Oper Berlin
Photo gallery
© Ruth Tromboukis, Sandra Kastl
© Ruth Tromboukis, Sandra Kastl
© Ruth Tromboukis, Sandra Kastl
Deutsche Oper Berlin
The Deutsche Oper Berlin is an opera company located in the Charlottenburg district of Berlin, Germany. The resident building is the country's second largest opera house and also home to the Berlin State Ballet.
The company's history goes back to the Deutsches Opernhaus built by the then independent city of Charlottenburg—the "richest town of Prussia"—according to plans designed by Heinrich Seeling from 1911. It opened on November 7, 1912 with a performance of Beethoven's Fidelio, conducted by Ignatz Waghalter. After the incorporation of Charlottenburg by the 1920 Greater Berlin Act, the name of the resident building was changed to Städtische Oper (Municipal Opera) in 1925.
Deutsches Opernhaus, 1912
With the Nazi Machtergreifung in 1933, the opera was under control of the Reich Ministry of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda. Minister Joseph Goebbels had the name changed back to Deutsches Opernhaus, competing with the Berlin State Opera in Mitte controlled by his rival, the Prussian minister-president Hermann Göring. In 1935, the building was remodeled by Paul Baumgarten and the seating reduced from 2300 to 2098. Carl Ebert, the pre-World War II general manager, chose to emigrate from Germany rather than endorse the Nazi view of music, and went on to co-found the Glyndebourne opera festival in England. He was replaced by Max von Schillings, who acceded to enact works of "unalloyed German character". Several artists, like the conductor Fritz Stiedry or the singer Alexander Kipnis followed Ebert into emigration. The opera house was destroyed by a RAF air raid on 23 November 1943. Performances continued at the Admiralspalast in Mitte until 1945. Ebert returned as general manager after the war.
After the war, the company in what was now West Berlin used the nearby building of the Theater des Westens until the opera house was rebuilt. The sober design by Fritz Bornemann was completed on 24 September 1961. The opening production was Mozart's Don Giovanni. The new building opened with the current name.
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