NIXON in CHINA Live Broadcast: FEBRUARY 12, 2011 (1:00 Pm ET) Encore Broadcast: MARCH 12, 2011 (1:00 Pm ET)
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John Adams NIXON IN CHINA Live Broadcast: FEBRUARY 12, 2011 (1:00 pm ET) Encore Broadcast: MARCH 12, 2011 (1:00 pm ET) CONDUCTOR John Adams’s groundbreaking 1987 work has its Met premiere in a production by Peter Sellars, John Adams in his Met debut. “All of my operas have dealt on deep psychological levels with our American PRODUCTION mythology,” Adams says. “The meeting of Nixon and Mao is a mythological moment in Peter Sellars American history.” The composer’s operatic exploration of the President’s 1972 encounter with SET DESIGNER Communist China stars James Maddalena as Nixon, reprising his acclaimed portrayal from Adrianne Lobel the opera’s world premiere. Adams makes his Met conducting debut. COSTUME DESIGNER Dunya Ramicova LIGHTING DESIGNER James F. Ingalls ACT I CHOREOGRAPHER An airfield outside Peking, China: it is a cold, clear, dry morning: Monday, February Mark Morris 21, 1972. Contingents of army, navy, and air force circle the field and sing “The Three SOUND DESIGNER Main Rules of Discipline and the Eight Points of Attention.” Premier Chou En-lai, Mark Grey accompanied by a small group of officials, strolls onto the runway just as The Spirit of CHIANG CH’ING ’76 taxis into view. President Nixon disembarks. They shake hands and the President Kathleen Kim sings of his excitement and his fears. PAT NIXON Janis Kelly An hour later he is meeting with Chairman Mao. Mao’s conversational armory contains philosophical apothegms, unexpected political observations, and gnomic MAO TSE-TUNG Robert Brubaker jokes, and everything he sings is amplified by his secretaries and the Premier. It is not easy for a Westerner to hold his own in such a dialogue. CHOU EN-LAI Russell Braun After the audience with Mao, everyone at the first evening’s banquet is euphoric. The RICHARD NIXON President and Mrs. Nixon manage to exchange a few words before Premier Chou rises James Maddalena to make the first of the evening’s toasts, a tribute to patriotic fraternity. The President HENRY KISSINGER replies, toasting the Chinese people and the hope of peace. The toasts continue, with Richard Paul Fink less formality, as the night goes on. COMING SOON! INTERMISSION IPHIGÉNIE EN TAURIDE Live February 26, 2011 Encore March 26, 2011 ACT II Snow has fallen during the night. In the morning, Mrs. Nixon is ushered onstage by LUCIA DI LAMMERMOOR Live March 19, 2011 her party of guides and journalists. She explains a little of what it feels like for a Encore April 2, 2011 woman like her to be First Lady, and accepts a glass elephant from the workers at the Peking Glass Factory. She visits the Evergreen People’s Commune and the Summer Other upcoming eveNtS Palace, where she pauses in the Gate of Longevity and Goodwill to sing, “This is National Theatre Live prophetic!” Then, on to the Ming Tombs before sunset. FraNkenstein Live - March 17 , 2011 In the evening, the Nixons attend a performance of The Red Detachment of Women, Encore - March 31, 2011 a revolutionary ballet devised by Mao’s wife, Chiang Ch’ing. The ballet entwines the Cherry OrChard ideological rectitude with Hollywood-style emotion. The Nixons respond to the latter; Live - June 30, 2011 they are drawn to the downtrodden peasant girl—in fact, they are drawn into the La phil LIve action on the side of simple virtue. This was not precisely what Chiang Ch’ing had in Live - March 13, 2011 mind. She sings “I am the wife of Mao Tse-tung,” ending with full choral backing. Dudamel conducts Tchaikovsky INTERMISSION TicketS are now on SaLe Visit www.metopera.org/ ACT III HDLive or call your local The last evening in Peking. The pomp and public displays of the presidential visit are theatre for more information and a complete schedule. over, and the main players all return to the solitude of their bedrooms. The talk turns The Met: Live in HD series is made to memories of the past. Mao and his wife dance, and the Nixons recall the early days possible by a generous grant from The Neubauer Family Foundation. of their marriage during the Second World War, when he was stationed as a naval Production a gift of the Gramma Fisher commander in the Pacific. Chou concludes the opera with the question of whether Foundation, Marshalltown, Iowa anything they did was good. Additional funding from American Express Company Production originally created by English National Opera Bloomberg is the global corporate sponsor of The Met: Live in HD. HELP THE MET CONTINUE TO BRING In association with PBS, the HD Go to www.cineplex.com/events for more LIVE IN HD TO A THEATRE NEAR YOU! broadcasts are supported by Toll information about the exciting season of Visit metopera.org to contribute or send your Brothers, America’s luxury home opera and other upcoming events. gift to: The Metropolitan Opera, Lincoln Center, builder.® New York, NY, 10023.