It is a real wolf in sheep’s clothing who fazes Eurydice. Under the guise of the charming, nature-loving Monsieur Aristée, Pluto, the God of the underworld arrives in her life and suddenly everything is different: overcome with passion, she rapidly swaps her unfulfilled existence by the side of her Orpheus, a violin virtuoso who is as talented as he is vain, for the erotic temptations of Pluto’s shadowy realm. A twist of fate that Orpheus has no desire to hinder: Eurydice’s joyous escape to the land of death cannot happen fast enough for him. And there is actually nothing he wants to do less than be obliged to win back his licentious wife.

Jacques Offenbach and his librettist Ludovic Halévy seriously shake up ancient Greek mythology with their ‘Orpheus in the Underworld’. They use humour and double entendres to propel Orpheus’s search for his unbeloved from one cutting punchline to the next and to make the wild travesty for which Offenbach has crafted a bespoke score full of musical quotations socially acceptable. Director Barrie Kosky gets thoroughly to grips with the escapist life of this divine rogue, returning to the Deutsche Oper am Rhein with this acclaimed co-production between the Salzburg Festival and the Komische Oper Berlin. read less