5 Things to Know about RIGOLETTO

Verdi’s sixteenth opera would prove to be one of the composer’s greatest masterpieces: a thrilling tale of love, betrayal, and revenge centering on a complex play of manipulation and control between a womanizing duke, a tragic jester, and his daughter.

Read on to learn more about this giant of the operatic canon before joining us for Rigoletto at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in Winter 2026!

“Immorality and obscene triviality”

Francesco Maria Piave based his libretto on Le roi s’amuse, a five-act play by Victor Hugo inspired by the life of Francis I of France—a work that had proved so scandalous it was banned at its premiere in 1832. Verdi and PIave’s opera was also rejected in 1850 by the Austrian censor, which described the piece (originally titled La Maledizione) as "a repugnant [example of] immorality and obscene triviality." Only after significant revisions were made—including renaming characters and deleting some scenes—was permission granted by the censors for Rigoletto to premiere at La Fenice. 

Singing in the streets

Completed only a month ahead of the premiere, Rigoletto enjoyed a rapturous reception at its opening night on March 11, 1851. The Duke’s Act III aria “La donna è mobile” (“Woman is fickle”) proved so popular it was sung in the streets the next day—apparently validating Verdi’s decision to only reveal it to the cast and orchestra a few hours before the performance. A massive box-office success and Verdi’s first major triumph since Macbeth, Rigoletto ran for 13 performances and was revived the following year and again in 1854.

Popular, but not lightweight

Renowned for its rich melodic offerings which include the arias “Caro nome” and “La donna è mobile”—the latter based on a phrase that Francis I was said to have engraved into a window pane (“Women are fickle, whoever trusts them is a fool”)—Rigoletto has inspired countless musical riffs in film and television and provided a staple of the Venetian gondolier repertoire. Musicologist Julian Budden described the opera as “revolutionary” in blurring the distinction between formal melody and recitative, while Igor Stravinsky wrote that “in the aria ‘La donna è mobile’...which the elite thinks only brilliant and superficial, there is more substance and feeling that in the whole of Wagner’s Ring cycle.”

Beautiful daughter of love

Although initially lukewarm about the prospect of his play being turned into an Italian opera, Victor Hugo attended a performance in Paris and was immediately won over by the Act III quartet “Bella figlia dell’amore” (“Beautiful daughter of love”). Verdi’s ability to convey the emotions of four characters at once is believed to have impressed the author to such an extent that he remarked that he wished the same effect could be achieved in spoken drama.

Monkeys and mafiosos

In the 175 years since its premiere, Rigoletto has undergone countless fresh interpretations that have included setting the action among the 1950s New York Mafia (1982, English National Opera), in Mussolini’s Italy (2004 and 2014, Seattle Opera), in 1960s Las Vegas (2013, Metropolitan Opera)—and even relocating the Court of Mantua to The Planet of the Apes (2005, Bavarian State Opera). In 2014, Opera Queensland presented a version of the opera set amid the debauched party world of former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi. In our production, director Christopher Alden locates the story in a Victorian men’s club—a lavish and resonant setting for this timelessly riveting musical drama.