In 2016, the Bolshoi gave Puccini’s smash hit of 1893 its house premiere, starring Anna Netrebko as opera’s ultimate material girl. Netrebko has moved on, but the production has proved durable, returning yearly for healthy runs. Designed for maximum visual contrast from act to act (there are four), the show plays to adults only. Mind you, the same X-rating applies to Carmen and Dido and Aeneas, as well as the ballets Nureyev and The Taming of the Shrew; likewise, less implausibly, to a new Salome announced for February, listing Tugan Sohiev as conductor but no cast. —M.G.
Manon Lescaut, by Giacomo Puccini
Bolshoi Opera
Theatre Square, 1, Moskva, Russia, 125009
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