A nun’s take on the death penalty
Christine Rice is the centre of the production.
MANUEL HARLAN
Based on the real-life experience of Sister Helen Prejean, the opera follows the American nun into the Louisiana State Penitentiary, where she meets the double murderer Joseph De Rocher
Suicide, infanticide, incest, torture: opera doesn’t shy away from taboos. But few lean quite as far into moral ambiguity as Dead Man Walking. The composer Jake Heggie and librettist Terrence McNally take opera’s weaponry – big melodies, orchestral power, confessional arias and massed choruses – and turn it in on itself. A double murderer croons with luscious, lyrical beauty.
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