Love, lust, and lethality
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk
Dmitri Schostakowitsch
Last Chance
After bringing Dmitri Shostakovich’s early opera The Nose to life in a wonderfully grotesque staging, Barrie Kosky now turns his attention to a far more radical work by the Russian composer: Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, a dark tale of sex and violence featuring one of opera’s most fascinating female characters.
Young and married into wealth, Katerina is nonetheless utterly miserable. Longing for love and joy, she finds herself trapped in a life of dreary boredom, neglected by her impotent husband and humiliated by her cruel father-in-law. In her loneliness, Katerina embarks on a passionate affair with the reckless womanizer Sergei. What begins as an erotic escape soon spirals into a series of chilling murders...
Young and married into wealth, Katerina is nonetheless utterly miserable. Longing for love and joy, she finds herself trapped in a life of dreary boredom, neglected by her impotent husband and humiliated by her cruel father-in-law. In her loneliness, Katerina embarks on a passionate affair with the reckless womanizer Sergei. What begins as an erotic escape soon spirals into a series of chilling murders...
Premiering in 1934, Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk broke numerous taboos of the time. Sexual acts and murderous intrigues are laid bare within an orchestral soundscape that is as erotic as it is brutal. As if that weren’t provocative enough, the composer also consistently sympathizes with his anti-heroine, a woman who, despite all her violent deeds, cannot help but move most every heart.
The 2025 Year of Shostakovich will be celebrated at the Komische Oper with a season of his works: opening with his Trio chamber composition, it then moves to the main stage with an opera double bill featuring The Nose and Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, both under Barrie Kosky’s inimitable direction.
ACT 1
Katerina Izmailova is desperately unhappy. She escaped straitened circumstances by getting married and now lives a joyless life at the side of the merchant Zinovy Borisovich Izmailov, who can o er her neither children nor affection and tenderness. Worse still is Katerina’s father-in-law, the family tyrant Boris Timofeyevich Izmailov, who constantly puts her down and orders her around.
It doesn’t improve matters when Zinovy is unexpectedly called away on business, as Katerina’s sexually burnt-out husband has hired a new labourer, Sergei – young, attractive, dangerous, the very opposite of Zinovy! For Katerina, the new worker offers an ideal opportunity to satisfy her desires. Not that Sergei does much to commend himself: first he joins other workers in gang-raping Aksinya, a domestic, and even gets caught in the act by Katerina. Instead of showing remorse, Sergei is then brazen enough to challenge Katerina to a »Fight«, which she agrees to after some hesitation. The »Fight« turns out to be a species of foreplay, as that night Sergei tricks his way into her bedroom on some pretext and subjects Katerina to a forceful seduction, to which after initial resistance she surrenders.
Katerina Izmailova is desperately unhappy. She escaped straitened circumstances by getting married and now lives a joyless life at the side of the merchant Zinovy Borisovich Izmailov, who can o er her neither children nor affection and tenderness. Worse still is Katerina’s father-in-law, the family tyrant Boris Timofeyevich Izmailov, who constantly puts her down and orders her around.
It doesn’t improve matters when Zinovy is unexpectedly called away on business, as Katerina’s sexually burnt-out husband has hired a new labourer, Sergei – young, attractive, dangerous, the very opposite of Zinovy! For Katerina, the new worker offers an ideal opportunity to satisfy her desires. Not that Sergei does much to commend himself: first he joins other workers in gang-raping Aksinya, a domestic, and even gets caught in the act by Katerina. Instead of showing remorse, Sergei is then brazen enough to challenge Katerina to a »Fight«, which she agrees to after some hesitation. The »Fight« turns out to be a species of foreplay, as that night Sergei tricks his way into her bedroom on some pretext and subjects Katerina to a forceful seduction, to which after initial resistance she surrenders.
ACT 2
The adulterous liaison in the Izmailov household doesn’t go unnoticed for long. One day Boris catches Sergei stealthily leaving the scene, and whips him to within an inch of his life. Retribution is swift, with Katerina mixing rat poison into the food she is preparing for her father-in-law. Boris dies in agony while eating his favourite dish, mushrooms. They are what caused Boris’s sudden death, Katerina claims – and she gets away with it. Nobody suspects anything, and Sergei and Katerina can carry on with their nocturnal escapades …
… until one night Zinovy returns from his business trip. Katerina is alarmed; Sergei manages to hide just in time. But their a air comes to light the moment Zinovy finds Sergei’s belt, which he promptly uses to give Katerina a thrashing. When Katerina calls out for Sergei, he emerges from his hiding place and kills Zinovy with Katerina’s assistance. Together they hide the body. Now nothing stands in the way of Sergei and Katerina getting married.
ACT 3
Cocktail for a corpse: While Katerina and Sergei host a large and lavish wedding reception, a drunken guest – more by chance than shrewd detective work – discovers Zinovy’s body, loses all self-control, and rushes o to fetch the police. The reported incident is very welcome, as it allows the police to attend the wedding after all, even though they hadn’t been invited.
Shortly afterwards Katerina and Sergei are arrested, their attempt to escape having failed. Katerina, who is anyway tormented by a bad conscience, confesses to the murder. Sergei seems rather less pleased. They are both sentenced to hard labour for life.
ACT 4
On the march to the labour camp, men and women are separated. While they rest for the night, Katerina manages to bribe the guard and make her way over to Sergei. Her need for tenderness is shatteringly rebuffed by Sergei, who blames her for his incarceration. She returns chastened to the women’s camp.
Sergei meanwhile has new plans. He is fixated on Sonyetka, a beautiful young camp inmate. Sonyetka turns the situation to her own advantage and lays out her demands: Sergei can only have sex with her if he can provide her with Katerina’s warm stockings. Sergei then sweet-talks Katerina, who is too glad of his sudden change of heart to muster the appropriate scepticism. She hands him the stockings, and he hurries o to give them to Sonyetka in order to enter the promised »paradise« with her. Only now does Katerina realise Sergei’s double-dealing, and her last glimmer of hope fades before her eyes. She has nothing more to lose. When she finds herself an object of mockery for her fellow female inmates, there’s no holding her back. With her last strength, she takes Sonyetka’s life and then her own
Opera in four acts [1934]
based on a novella by Nikolai S. Leskov
Libretto by Alexander G. Preis
based on a novella by Nikolai S. Leskov
Libretto by Alexander G. Preis
Premiere on January 31, 2026
Recommended from grade 11
Russian
3hr 10min incl. intermission
The production contains depictions of physical and sexual violence/rape.