The Italian director is making her French debut with this production. Scarpia, whose spectre hangs over the first notes of the orchestra and to whom Tosca’s last words are addressed. Scarpia who would probably end up as king or pope if the kiss of death did not put a halt to his career. Sadistic Scarpia the sadomasochistic hygienist who hides his inner corruption and moral decay under his maniacal gestures. Scarpia who tortures and rapes to achieve his ends. In her eyes, he is the embodiment of pure evil, the most consummate bastard ever to grace an opera stage. Her version of Tosca could have been called Scarpia, given that the chief of the secret police is its central figure. Silvia Paoli’s childhood was peppered with the opera anecdotes that her aunt told her. Set against the backdrop of the hunt for republicans in Rome in 1800, Puccini pairs his drama with a most sensual and erotic score: music that would ensure the immortality of Tosca while Sardou’s play would tiptoe into oblivion. However, her jealousy and the unbridled desire of which she is the object precipitates the downfall of that world. In the play written by Victorien Sardou and first performed by the dazzling Sarah Bernhardt, the world revolves around a diva.

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