A convent, of all places, is the setting for a three-way wedding: young Luisa was supposed to marry the rich fishmonger Mendoza, but she loves the handsome and penniless Antonio. Her old nurse, Duenna, on the other hand, has long had her eye on the fishmonger and is only too happy to swap clothes and roles with the young Luisa. Her brother Ferdinand, on the other hand, loves the rich Clara, who has decided to enter a convent after a quarrel. Thus begins a turbulent game of mistaken identity in which not only the constantly drunk monks of the monastery lose track of who actually wants to marry whom - and yet in the end they give their blessing to the three couples. Sergei Prokofiev's The Betrothal in the Monastery is based on an 18th century English comedy. In the midst of a time of fear and violence, between Stalinist terror and war, Prokofiev wrote this lyrical-comic opera, which does not fit in at all with the state guidelines of proletarian art and patriotic propaganda. Instead, Prokofiev's Obrutschenije w monastyre presents people with wit and charm who, with their timeless desires and weaknesses, could have come straight out of the Commedia dell'Arte. Damiano Michieletto, who has celebrated many successes at the Theater an der Wien, directs this turbulent comedy of mistaken identity about fish trading and carnal desires.
Premiere: March 26, 2025
Further performances: March 28 and 31; April 2, 5, 7 and 9, 2025
www.theater-wien.at