NICHOLAS MAW

 

Sophie’s Choice

 

Narrator: Dale Duesing

Stingo: Gordon Gietz

Sophie: Angelika Kirchschlager

Nathan: Rod Gilfry

Librarian: Adrian Clarke

Yetta Zimmerman: Frances McCafferty

Zbigniew Bieganski: Stafford Dean

Wanda: Stephanie Friede

Eva: Abigail Browne

Jan: Billy Clerkin

Old woman on train: Gillian Knight

Young man on train: Neil Gillespie

Rudolph Franz Höss: Jorma Silvasti

Doctor: Alan Opie

Bartender: Darren Jeffery

Larry Landau: Quentin Hayes

Royal Opera Chorus

 

Orchestra of the Royal Opera House / Simon Rattle

Stage Director: Trevor Nunn

 

Recorded live at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, London, on 21st December 2002.

 

Extra features:

Illustrated synopsis.

Cast gallery

Interview with Simon Rattle

 

In 2002, Nicholas Maw’s opera Sophie’s Choice, based on the novel by William Styron, was given its premiere at the Royal Opera House. The subject had struck Maw when he had first watched the film several years previously, and he immediately felt it would be ‘the most extraordinary basis for an opera’.  Commissioned by the Royal Opera House and BBC Radio 3, Maw embarked on an adaptation of Styron’s book, which took six years to complete.

 

Conducted by Simon Rattle, a long-term enthusiast of Nicholas Maw’s music, and with a wonderful cast led by Angelika Kirchschlager, Rod Gilfry, Dale Duesing and Gordon Gietz, the work won international acclaim and was later restaged in Washington, Berlin and Vienna. The Royal Opera House celebrates the work of this British composer, who died in 2009, with the release on DVD of the BBC transmission, as broadcast live in December 2002.

 

“…the central performances of Angelika Kirschlager and Rodney Gilfry as doomed lovers Sophie and Nathan were deemed to be among the most committed and convincing ever seen at the Royal Opera House…..” The Independent

 

Running time 223 mins

Region code All regions

Picture format 16:9 Anamorphic Sound format 2.0 & 5.0 PCM

Menu language

EN Subtitles EN/FR/DE/ES/IT/NL

Dimensions (mm) W135 H190 D15

 

BBC Opus Arte 2DVDs OA1024D