History of creation:
In 1851, the play The Tales of Hoffmann by Michel Carré and Jules Barbier was staged in Paris. the writer himself. Barbier later revised the play into a libretto. Offenbach worked intensively on the opera until his death in 1880, but did not have time to finish it. He orchestrated the first act himself; the rest was to be done by the composer Ernst Giro. The opera was a huge success in Paris on February 10, 1881, where already in the first season it was performed 101 times.
About the performance:
The opera was staged in Volgograd for the first time. The original concept and painstaking staging work are the merit of the well-known Russian opera director Mikhail Pandzhavidze, who was invited to the theater. He was able to reveal the meanings and place accents in this multi-layered, ambiguous, sometimes absurd production, as well as to visualize the fantastic visions and nightmares of the brilliant storyteller, thanks to the talented set design of the German theater designer Harry Hummel and the costumes created by the Moscow artist Tatyana Kondrychina.
