Giaccomo Puccini: Turandot
Synopsis
Prologue
1924
Giacomo Puccini is lying in his room shrouded in white sheets, attended by three physicians. He is composing Turandot in the grips of a deadly disease. Fear that he will never complete the work is causing him to hallucinate. The white sheets vanish as if plucked aside by a ghostly hand to reveal an the China of legends. The characters in the opera take possession of the room as in a surrealistic nightmare. The three physicians turn into Puccini’s servants and seek revenge on him for the poor way he has treated them by forcing him to assume the role of the blinded Timur. In Puccini’s eyes, the serving girl who rushes to his assistance takes on the form of the slave girl Liù. A stranger, in whom Puccini sees himself as a young man, comes to her aid. The servants are transformed into Ping, Pang and Pong in the masks of renowned film clowns.
Act I
Princess Turandot demands the life of any suitor who fails to answer three riddles she sets him. A Mandarin announces that the Prince of Persia, the most recent suitor, has been sentenced to death, and a curious crowd has gathered to watch his execution. Turandot appears – like a vision – in the “moon” and gives the order for the execution to take place. The young man, blinded by her beauty, wishes to win her hand and refuses to be deterred by the warnings of either Liù, who is in love with him, or his father Timur or of Ping, Pang and Pong. He strikes the moon as a sign that he is ready to answer the questions.
Act II
Ping, Pang and Pong have had enough of executing people and long for a peaceful life in the country. The pending riddle test rudely interrupts their dreaming. Crowds have gathered before the Emperor. Turandot appears. With her questions she intends to get her revenge on the man who once shamed and murdered her foremother. The young man solves the three riddles. The Emperor, witnessed by the jubilant crowd, orders Turandot to keep her promise, but this she does not wish to do. The young man, who desires not fulfilment of her duty but her love, now sets the Princess a riddle: if, by morning, she can discover his name, then he is ready to die.
Act III
The young man believes he can win, though no one in all Peking will get any sleep that night until his name has been discovered. Ping, Pang and Pong try in vain to make him unlock his secret. Turandot tries to force Timur and Liù to disclose the name of the young man. Liù refuses to deceive the man she loves, even under torture, and kills herself instead. Timur takes leave of Liù. He lays his clothes aside. The ageing Puccini dies.
Epilogue
“Here ends the work of the master.” The characters in the opera pause for a moment with the uncompleted work. “Turandot” and the “young man” “find” the opera completed by Franco Alfano. The drama ends with a great duet in which the young man folds the Princess in his embrace and reveals to her his name: Calaf. Turandot informs the crowd of the stranger’s name – it is “Love”.