Love conquers all? Not in The Land of Smiles (1929), an operetta from the pen of Franz Lehár. At home in Vienna, the aristocratic Lisa falls hard for the Chinese diplomat Prince Sou-Chong, whom she follows to Beijing when he’s called back to take over the government. Alas, the cultural divide is unbridgeable. A Brit would handle the situation with a stiff upper lip, but in the Mysterious East of operetta, what’s called for is an enigmatic smile. Once the property of the superstar tenor Richard Tauber, Sou-Chong’s schmaltzy part has passed to Piotr Beczała, who will know just what to do with it. The glittering Julia Kleiter is Lisa. —Matthew Gurewitsch