The Exterminating Angel

Story

Synopsis

After last season’s The Dante Project, the Paris Opera continues to explore the music of contemporary composer Thomas Adès with the French premiere of The Exterminating Angel. Inspired by Luis Buñuel’s 1962 surrealist film, which offered a scathing critique of the bourgeoisie, the work begins with a dinner among upper-class friends in a plush mansion after an opera performance. But, gradually, a mysterious force prevents the fifteen guests from leaving the reception. In this confinement for no apparent reason, drawn out over several days, the veneer of propriety cracks, revealing the worst of human nature. Thomas Adès has written a rich and tense score, amplifying the libretto’s strange atmosphere with unusual instruments such as the ondes Martenot. The Paris Opera has entrusted the staging of this huis-clos to Calixto Bieito. The director has long been fascinated by Buñuel’s universe.

Director

Calixto Bieito

Writers

Thomas Adès

Language

English

Country

France

Release date

29 February 2024

Ensemble

Cast

• Jacquelyn Stucker

  Lucia de Nobile

• Gloria Tronel

  Leticia Meynar

• Hilary Summers

  Leonora Palma

• Claudia Boyle

  Silvia de Avila

• 

  Christine Rice

  Blanca Delgado

• Amina Edris

  Beatriz

• Nicky Spence

  Edmundo de Nobile

• Frédéric Antoun

  Comte Raul Ybenes

• 

  Jarett Ott

  Colonel Alvaro Gomez

• 

  Anthony Roth Costanzo

  Francisco de Avila

• Filipe Manu

  Eduardo

• Philippe Sly

  Senor Russel