Here’s everything you need to know about ENO’s production of La traviata.

It’s a romantic tragedy by Verdi…

In the second half of the nineteenth century composer Giuseppe Verdi dominated the Italian opera scene. In 1853 he composed La traviata. As with all of Verdi’s operas, La traviata deals with human emotions – love, envy, jealousy, loyalty and hatred.

Literally translating to ‘The Fallen Woman’, La traviata is a tragic tale about Parisian courtesan, Violetta, who attempts to leave the life she knows behind, in an attempt to finally find true love.

Read the full synopsis

The opera’s premiere didn’t go down too well with audiences…

La traviata premiered at the La Fenice opera house in Venice on the 6 March 1853 and was set to an Italian libretto by Francesco Maria Piave. Throughout its premiere, audience members mocked the fact that Fanny Salvini-Donatelli, the soprano singing the role of Violetta, was an unrealistic choice as a desired courtesan.

Verdi described the opening as a fiasco, but was sure that La traviata would be a success in the end. He was right. The production was revised a year later, with more suitable singers, and to this day continues to be one of Verdi’s best known works.

The opera is based on a real life story…

Verdi often liked to base his opera’s on pre-existing work or historical fact; Rigoletto was based on a play by Victor Hugo; Il trovatore, based on a text by Gutierrez; and La traviata, based on Alexandre Dumas’s novel, La Dame aux Camelias. The title character in his novel, Marguerite Gautier, a courtesan, is based on Marie Duplessis, a woman Dumas actually had a brief love affair with.

You’ve probably heard it before…

Violetta’s ‘Sempre Libera’ is probably the best known aria from the opera. If you’re not familiar with it from the name alone, you can hear the aria being sung when Edward and Vivienne visit the opera in Pretty Woman. Have a watch of this clip from the film…

Take a look at some of these other well known opera scenes in films