Oper

Giuseppe Verdi

Don Carlo

Dramma lirico in vier Akten (Mailänder Fassung, 1884)

nach dem französischen Libretto der Oper von Joseph Méry und Camile du Locle in der italienischen Übertragung

von Achille de Lauzières & Angelo Zanardini

Sunday 23. March 2025 One intermission Main Stage
Area 1 242 €
Area 1

242 €

Area 2 198 €
Area 2

198 €

Area 3 165 €
Area 3

165 €

Area 4 113 €
Area 4

113 €

Area 5 89 €
Area 5

89 €

Area 6 65 €
Area 6

65 €

Area 7 42 €
Area 7

42 €

Area 8 29 €
Area 8

29 €

Area 9 17 €
Area 9

17 €

Standing room
Standing room


Cast at
23. March 2025

Rodrigo, Marquis von Posa

Der Großinquisitor

Elisabetta

Musikalische Leitung

Regie, Bühne, Kostüme

Ko-Kostümbildnerin

Galya Solodovnikova

Choreographie und Regieassistenz

Evgeny Kulagin

Mitarbeit Bühnenbild

Olga Pavluk

Licht

Franck Evin

Video

Ilya Shagalov

Musik-Dramaturgie

Daniil Orlov

3 more dates

Don Carlo

Cast at Thursday 13. March 2025

Rodrigo, Marquis von Posa

Der Großinquisitor

Vitalij Kowaljow

Elisabetta

Musikalische Leitung

Regie, Bühne, Kostüme

Ko-Kostümbildnerin

Galya Solodovnikova

Choreographie und Regieassistenz

Evgeny Kulagin

Mitarbeit Bühnenbild

Olga Pavluk

Licht

Franck Evin

Video

Ilya Shagalov

Musik-Dramaturgie

Daniil Orlov
Area 1 242 €
Area 1

242 €

Area 2 198 €
Area 2

198 €

Area 3 165 €
Area 3

165 €

Area 4 113 €
Area 4

113 €

Area 5 89 €
Area 5

89 €

Area 6 65 €
Area 6

65 €

Area 7 42 €
Area 7

42 €

Area 8 29 €
Area 8

29 €

Area 9 17 €
Area 9

17 €

Standing room
Standing room

Included in: Subscription 19
Subscription 19

Season 2024/2025

Choose a day of the week and your favorite seats and enjoy five performances in one season.

The following performances are included in this subscription:

07. November 2024: BILLY BUDD
19. December 2024: LES CONTES D’HOFFMANN
16. January 2025: BALLET: SHIFTING SYMMETRIES
13. March 2025: DON CARLO
10. April 2025: SALOME

Don Carlo

Cast at Sunday 16. March 2025

Rodrigo, Marquis von Posa

Der Großinquisitor

Vitalij Kowaljow

Elisabetta

Musikalische Leitung

Regie, Bühne, Kostüme

Ko-Kostümbildnerin

Galya Solodovnikova

Choreographie und Regieassistenz

Evgeny Kulagin

Mitarbeit Bühnenbild

Olga Pavluk

Licht

Franck Evin

Video

Ilya Shagalov

Musik-Dramaturgie

Daniil Orlov
Area 1 242 €
Area 1

242 €

Area 2 198 €
Area 2

198 €

Area 3 165 €
Area 3

165 €

Area 4 113 €
Area 4

113 €

Area 5 89 €
Area 5

89 €

Area 6 65 €
Area 6

65 €

Area 7 42 €
Area 7

42 €

Area 8 29 €
Area 8

29 €

Area 9 17 €
Area 9

17 €

Standing room
Standing room

U27  
Don Carlo

Cast at Thursday 20. March 2025

Rodrigo, Marquis von Posa

Der Großinquisitor

Vitalij Kowaljow

Elisabetta

Musikalische Leitung

Regie, Bühne, Kostüme

Ko-Kostümbildnerin

Galya Solodovnikova

Choreographie und Regieassistenz

Evgeny Kulagin

Mitarbeit Bühnenbild

Olga Pavluk

Licht

Franck Evin

Video

Ilya Shagalov

Musik-Dramaturgie

Daniil Orlov
Area 1 242 €
Area 1

242 €

Area 2 198 €
Area 2

198 €

Area 3 165 €
Area 3

165 €

Area 4 113 €
Area 4

113 €

Area 5 89 €
Area 5

89 €

Area 6 65 €
Area 6

65 €

Area 7 42 €
Area 7

42 €

Area 8 29 €
Area 8

29 €

Area 9 17 €
Area 9

17 €

Standing room
Standing room

Included in: Cycle »Verdi«
Cycle »Verdi«

Season 2024/2025

Central works by the Italian composer Giuseppe Verdi united in one cycle. You will gain a comprehensive insight into the composer's musical oeuvre and his timeless significance for the world of opera.

15. October 2024: MACBETH
29. December 2024: RIGOLETTO
2. Febuary 2025: IL TROVATORE
20. March 2025: DON CARLO

Short Summary

Don Carlo, heir to the Spanish throne, was supposed to marry the French princess Elisabeth.

After meeting for the first time, the two are in love. Surprisingly, the Spanish King Philip II announces that he wants to marry Elisabeth himself. Elisabeth complies for reasons of state. The liberal Marquis Posa advises his desperate friend Don Carlo to become politically active for a better future for Flanders. However, this puts Don Carlo and Posa in dangerous opposition to the overpowering Grand Inquisitor.

Don Carlo

Storyline

Emperor Charles V - once the most powerful ruler in the world - laid down the insignia of his power in the monastery of San Yuste to end his life in the solitude of spiritual meditation.

Don Carlo, Infante of Spain, commemorates his happy meeting with the French princess Elisabeth, who had been promised to him, in Fontainebleau in the monastery of San Yuste. However, Elisabeth was then married by his father, King Philip II, and made queen and thus Carlo's stepmother. Carlo is met by his childhood friend, the Marquis of Posa, who has returned from the Flandrian provinces, which were oppressed by the Spanish. Posa convinces Don Carlo to go to Flanders as the savior of the threatened people. Philip and Elisabeth enter the monastery to pray at the tomb of the supposedly deceased emperor.

In a garden not far from the monastery, Princess Eboli entertains the retinue of ladies-in-waiting with a Moorish song. When the queen appears, the Marquis of Posa is reported. The Marquis manages to secretly deliver a message from Carlo to the Queen and request a secret audience for him. Princess Eboli, the king's mistress, misunderstands his hints and believes that the Infante has fallen in love with her.

Alone with the queen, Carlo can no longer hide his feelings. Elisabeth, who still loves the prince but is aware of her duty as queen, implores the desperate man to renounce the fulfillment of his love.

When the king finds his wife unaccompanied, he expels the Countess of Aremberg, who is responsible for this, from court. Elisabeth bids farewell to the exile.

Posa describes the misery of the people of Flanders to the ruler. Philip, who takes a liking to Posa's courageous language, decides to draw him close to him as his confidant, but warns him of the power of the Inquisition. Don Carlo has accepted an invitation to a rendezvous in the royal park in Madrid, assuming that Elisabeth has sent it to him. When a veiled woman approaches, he storms her with declarations of love. Too late, he realizes that he has revealed his secret to Princess Eboli. Posa arrives and tries to silence the dangerous confidant, but Carlo falls into his arms. The princess, wounded in her pride, swears revenge. The Marquis has his friend hand over all the political letters that could endanger him.

A large crowd has gathered in front of Madrid Cathedral to attend an auto-da-fé, the public execution of heretics condemned by the Inquisition. At the head of a deputation from Flanders, Don Carlo approaches the king to demand the regency of the subjugated provinces. When the king rejects this request, the prince, overcome with rage, draws his sword. None of the greats of the realm come to the aid of the threatened ruler until Posa disarms his friend and is then elevated to duke by Philip. The auto-da-fé continues. The flames of the pyre blaze up, while a voice from heaven promises the victims eternal peace.

King Philip laments the loneliness and burden of his office. Conflicted by his conscience, he seeks advice from the blind Grand Inquisitor.

The latter encourages him in his intention to punish the Infante's rebellion with the utmost severity, but in turn demands the life of the Marquis of Posa, whom he suspects of being a free spirit. Philip initially resists, but ultimately submits to the power of the Church.

The queen makes a lively complaint to her husband about the theft of her jewelry box and finds it on the king's desk. When Philip opens the casket and discovers the portrait of the Infante inside, he accuses his wife of adultery. Princess Eboli and the Marquis of Posa rush to the aid of the fainting princess. Alone with the queen, the princess confesses her betrayal of Carlo and her secret liaison with the king. She is banished to a convent by Elisabeth.

Posa visits the imprisoned Infante in the dungeon to explain his actions and bid him farewell. With the help of the letters given to him, he has deflected any suspicion of conspiracy with Flanders from Carlo to give his friend the opportunity, as the future king, to help the oppressed peoples gain their right to live.

A shot from the ambush hits the Marquis in the back and, dying, he refers his friend to the Queen, who wishes to see Carlo one last time. The king enters the dungeon to return the sword to his son. Carlo accuses him of murdering his friend. The outraged people demand the Infante's release. When they turn against the king in rebellion, the aged Grand Inquisitor takes up arms. The people fall to their knees before his threat.

In the monastery of San Yuste, the Queen awaits the Infante, who is about to leave for Flanders, for a final farewell. The two lovers renounce all fulfillment of their love. The King and the Grand Inquisitor join them. As the henchmen of the Inquisition are about to lay hands on the prince, a mysterious monk, whose voice is reminiscent of that of the secluded emperor, takes Don Carlo away from his pursuers.

Act 1 & 2 105 min
Intermission 25 min
Act 3 & 4 80 min

Inspired by a visit to the Kyoto Costume Institute in Japan, director Kirill Serebrennikov brings the plot of Don Carlo into a contemporary context. He also drew inspiration for his stage design from this institute, where original objects from all eras and cultures are kept, prepared and stored in order to protect them from decay.

Serebrennikov's examination of this transience opened up another dimension of Verdi's opera: the knowledge of the transience of man, his passions, his efforts and his deeds, the flow of time that noticeably or imperceptibly erases and destroys everything man has made. Alongside these two dimensions - the remnants of the 16th century and the present day - there is a third level, an intermediate zone in which past and present intermingle.

The Marquis of Posa, the only figure who is not historically documented and who embodies the Enlightenment and modern man, also plays an important role in the production. In Serebrennikov's production, he plays an activist who addresses the consequences of the overproduction and overconsumption of textiles and clothing.

The musical language exhibits an almost morbid raffiness: an elegance, empfindsamkeit and rapture of the sweeping melodies, an abysmally shadowed harmony, darkly glowing orchestral colors that make all contrasts, however abrupt, appear veiled and muted.

Verdi worked on this opera, with interruptions, for over twenty years. There are no fewer than seven versions created with the composer's direct involvement. Italian productions of the five-act work, which premiered in Paris, gave Verdi the opportunity to make radical rewrites and to recompose entire scene complexes. A condensed four-act version was first presented at La Scala in Milan in 1884 - it will also form the basis of the new Viennese production.

© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi
© Frol Podlesnyi

Spotify Playlist


FAQ

Tickets for our standing room can be purchased online or at the Bundestheater box office from 10 am on the day of the performance. BundestheaterCard holders can book standing room tickets online the day before the performance.

In addition, a fixed contingent of standing room tickets is available for regular evening performances from 80 minutes before the start of the performance at our standing room box office (Operngasse entrance).

Our operas are sung in the original languages - these vary depending on the work.

At each seat, subtitles in different languages can be switched on or off via a separate subtitle screen. In addition to the original language of the opera, you can choose from up to eight languages: German, English, Italian, French, Russian, Japanese, Spanish, Chinese (Mandarin).

In the event of a change of performance, you can of course return or exchange your tickets.

As changes to the cast cannot be ruled out due to illnesses or other hindrances of artists, there is no entitlement to a refund of the ticket price or exchange in this case.

Tickets cannot be returned or exchanged if you are not admitted to the auditorium due to being late (even after the interval).

About Your Visit

Cloakroom

The cloakrooms are located next the the entrances at the Operngasse. You can find additional cloakrooms on the left and right side of the balcony and the gallery and in the boxes. All cloakrooms are free of charge.

Be on Time

We kindly ask you to arrive on time for the performances. Latecomers can only be admitted during the intermission. After the intermission, re-entry will not be possible.

Food and Drink

Our gastronomy opens at the same time entry is permitted. You can enjoy some snacks and drinks before the performance starts or you can book a table for the break.

Practical Information

You can find more practical information regarding your visit (e.g. Dresscode, barrier-free-access, …) here.

 

Discounts, Subscriptions, Cycles

Discounts

The Vienna State Opera offers the following discounts:

  • Under 27
  • Children- & Youth-Tickets
  • BundestheaterCard
  • Ballett-Bonus
  • Ö1-Club
  • Culture Pass »Hunger auf Kunst und Kultur«
  • Disability ID
More info

Subscriptions

Choose a week-day and your favorite seat and enjoy five performances.

  • 4x Opera, 1x Ballet
  • spread out over the whole season
  • up to 30 % discount compared to the regular ticket price
More info

Cycles

Buy multiple performances as a package!

  • big selection of different cycles
  • bundled together by composers, artists or topics
  • spread out over the whole season
  • up to 10 % discount compared to the regular ticket price
More info