Madama Butterfly in London
Teodor Ilincai will be PInkerton in five performances of Madama Butterfly at the Royal Opera House between April 13 - 25. He will perform alongside Ana María Martínez (Cio Cio San), Scott Hendricks (Sharpless), Carlo Bosi (Goro) and Elizabeth DeShong (Suzuki).
Giacomo Puccini was entranced by David Belasco’s play Madame Butterfly (based on a popular short story by John Luther Long) when he saw it in London in 1900. He harnessed the talents of librettists Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa (with whom Puccini had created La bohème and Tosca) to adapt Cio-Cio-San’s tragic tale for the operatic stage. Although the premiere at La Scala, Milan, in 1904 was poorly received, that same year Puccini revised and restaged the opera for performances in Brescia, to great acclaim. Madama Butterfly quickly became a hugely popular opera with performers and audiences alike, and remains one of Puccini’s most performed works.