Feb 2025

Virginia Opera

Conductor: Adam Turner

Cast:

Fiordiligi: Keely Futterer • Dorabella: Kristen Choi • Despina: Ashley Fabian

Fernando: Terrance Chin-Loy • Guglielmo: Ethan Vincent • Don Alfonso: Wm. Clay Thompson

Photo Credit: Dave Pearson Photography

Directorial Concept

In this production of Così fan tutte for Virginia Opera, the story is transposed to the roaring 1920s, drawing rich aesthetic and thematic inspiration from The Great Gatsby and the rebellious spirit of the flapper era. Against a backdrop of opulence, jazz-age excess, and gilded illusions, Fiordiligi and Dorabella begin as pampered high-society debutantes who gradually transform into daring, short-haired flappers asserting their own romantic and sexual autonomy. Don Alfonso’s wager becomes a cynical social experiment set within the intoxicating haze of lavish speakeasies and grand estate parties, where the line between genuine emotion and performative romance blurs. As the disguises take hold, the opera peels back the shiny veneer of 1920s decadence — using the flapper's defiant rejection of traditional morality to expose the fragile vulnerabilities, hidden desires, and sharp emotional disillusionment lying beneath the era's dazzling surface.