With Le nozze di Figaro, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791) demonstrated a great deal of political daring: after all, the literary model for the work, Beaumarchais' La folle journée, ou Le mariage de Figaro, was banned not only in France but also in Vienna. The librettist Lorenzo da Ponte had diplomatically defused the political explosiveness of the material. When the opera was premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on May 1, 1786, its effect was not quite as revolutionary as that of the original - but it was certainly an affront to the nobility. The adaptation reflects a timelessly valid human comedy, which initially met with rejection for said reasons, but gradually rose to become one of Mozart's most popular operas. The new production replaces the staging by Guillaume Bernardi, which premiered at the Frankfurt Opera in 2006/07.
