Merry Wives of Windsor (William Shakespeare) (Pepys' Diary) Anne Page – Mistress Page's daughter, in love with Fenton. Synopsis A watercolor of Act III, Scene iii: Falstaff wooing Mistress Ford. The play is nominally set in the early 15th century, during the same period as the Henry IV plays featuring Falstaff, but there is only one brief reference to this period, a line in which the character Fenton is said to have been one of Prince Hal's rowdy friends (he "kept company with the wild prince and Poins"). In all other respects, the play implies a contemporary setting of the Elizabethan era, c. 1600. Falstaff arrives in Windsor very short on money. He decides, to obtain financial advantage, that he will court two wealthy married women, Mistress Ford and Mistress Page. Falstaff decides to send the women identical love letters and asks his servants – Pistol and Nym – to deliver them to the wives. When they refuse, Falstaff sacks them, and, in revenge, the men tell Ford and Page (the husbands) of Falstaff's intentions.

Page is not concerned, but the jealous Ford persuades the Host of the Garter Inn to introduce him to Falstaff as a 'Master Brook' so that he can find out Falstaff's plans. Meanwhile, three different men are trying to win the hand of Page's daughter, Anne Page. Mistress Page would like her daughter to marry Doctor Caius, a French physician, whereas the girl's father would like her to marry Master Slender. Anne herself is in love with Master Fenton, but Page had previously rejected Fenton as a suitor due to his having squandered his considerable fortune on high-class living. Hugh Evans, a Welsh parson , tries to enlist the help of Mistress Quickly (servant to Doctor Caius) in wooing Anne for Slender, but the doctor discovers this and challenges Evans to a duel. The Host of the Garter Inn prevents this duel by telling both men a different meeting place, causing much amusement for himself, Justice Shallow, Page and others. Evans and Caius decide to work together to be revenged on the Host.

Henry Fuseli : "Falstaff in the Washbasket", 1792 When the women receive the letters, each goes to tell the other, and they quickly find that the letters are almost identical. The "merry wives" are not interested in the ageing, overweight Falstaff as a suitor; however, for the sake of their own amusement and to gain revenge for his indecent assumptions towards them both, they pretend to respond to his advances. This all results in great embarrassment for Falstaff. Mr. Ford poses as 'Mr. Brook' and says he is in love with Mistress Ford but cannot woo her as she is too virtuous. He offers to pay Falstaff to court her, saying that once she has lost her honour he will be able to tempt her himself. Falstaff cannot believe his luck, and tells 'Brook' he has already arranged to meet Mistress Ford while her husband is out. Falstaff leaves to keep his appointment and Ford soliloquises that he is right to suspect his wife and that the trusting Page is a fool. When Falstaff arrives to meet Mistress Ford, the merry wives trick him into hiding in a laundry basket ("buck basket") full of filthy, smelly clothes awaiting laundering.

When the jealous Ford returns to try and catch his wife with the knight, the wives have the basket taken away and the contents (including Falstaff) dumped into the river. Although this affects Falstaff's pride, his ego is surprisingly resilient. He is convinced that the wives are just "playing hard to get" with him, so he continues his pursuit of sexual advancement, with its attendant capital and opportunities for blackmail. Again Falstaff goes to meet the women but Mistress Page comes back and warns Mistress Ford of her husband's approach again. They try to think of ways to hide him other than the laundry basket which he refuses to get into again. They trick him again, this time into disguising himself as Mistress Ford's maid's obese aunt, known as "the fat woman of Brentford". Ford tries once again to catch his wife with the knight but ends up beating the "old woman", whom he despises, and throwing her out of his house. Black and blue, Falstaff laments his bad luck. Eventually the wives tell their husbands about the series of jokes they have played on Falstaff, and together they devise one last trick which ends up with the Knight being humiliated in front of the whole town.

They tell Falstaff to dress as " Herne, the Hunter " and meet them by an old oak tree in Windsor Forest (now part of Windsor Great Park ). They then dress several of the local children, including Anne and William Page, as fairies and get them to pinch and burn Falstaff to punish him. Page plots to dress Anne in white and tells Slender to steal her away and marry her during the revels. Mistress Page and Doctor Caius arrange to do the same, but they arrange Anne shall be dressed in green. Anne tells Fenton this, and he and the Host arrange for Anne and Fenton to be married instead. The title page from a 1565 printing of Giovanni Fiorentino's 14th century tale, Il Pecorone. The wives meet Falstaff, and almost immediately the "fairies" attack. Slender, Caius, and Fenton steal away their brides-to-be during the chaos, and the rest of the characters reveal their true identities to Falstaff. Although he is embarrassed, Falstaff takes the joke surprisingly well, as he sees it was what he deserved.

Ford says he must pay back the 20 pounds 'Brook' gave him and takes the Knight's horses as recompense. Slender suddenly appears and says he has been deceived – the 'girl' he took away to marry was not Anne but a young boy. Caius arrives with similar news – however, he has actually married his boy! Fenton and Anne arrive and admit that they love each other and have been married. Fenton chides the parents for trying to force Anne to marry men she did not love and the parents accept the marriage and congratulate the young pair. Eventually they all leave together and Mistress Page even invites Falstaff to come with them: "let us every one go home, and laugh this sport o'er by a country fire; Sir John and all". Sources Some elements of The Merry Wives of Windsor may have been adapted from Il Pecorone, a collection of stories by Ser Giovanni Fiorentino ; one of these stories was included in William Painter 's The Palace of Pleasure. [1] Date and text The play's date of composition is unknown; it was registered for publication in 1602, but was probably several years old by that date.

In the Fairy pageant in Act 5 Scene 5 (lines 54-75), Mistress Quickly, as the Queen of the Fairies, gives a long speech giving an elaborate description of the Order of the Garter . The play also alludes to a German duke, who is generally thought to be Frederick I, Duke of Württemberg , who had visited England in 1592 and was elected to the Order of the Garter in 1597 (but was eventually only installed in Stuttgart on 6 November 1603). [2] These facts led commentators starting with Edmond Malone in 1790 to suggest that the play was written and performed for the Order of the Garter festival. [3] William Green suggests that the play was drawn up when George Carey, as Lord Chamberlain and patron of Shakespeare's company, was elected Order of the Garter in April 1597. [4] If this is so, it was probably performed when Elizabeth I attended Garter Feast on 23 April.

The first page of The Merry Wives of Windsor, printed in the Second Folio of 1632 The Garter theory is only speculation, but it is consistent with a story first recorded by John Dennis in 1702 and Nicholas Rowe in 1709: that Shakespeare was commanded to write the play by Queen Elizabeth, who wanted to see Falstaff in love. This theatrical tradition was first recorded by Dennis in the prologue to his adaptation of the play, The Comical Gallant. He states that Queen Elizabeth "commanded it to be finished in fourteen days." [5] Rowe wrote that Elizabeth "was so well pleased with that admirable character of Falstaff, in the two parts of Henry the Fourth, that she commanded him to continue it for one play more, and to shew him in love." [5] T.W. Craik suggests that these stories may simply be fantasies occasioned by the Quarto's title page which says of the play "As it hath diuers times Acted...Both before her Maiestie, and else-where." [6] Nevertheless, Carey would have been well placed to pass on the queen's wishes to his players, which could account for the tradition.

[2] Support for the Garter theory is divided. If it is correct, it would probably mean that Shakespeare wrote The Merry Wives of Windsor between Henry IV part 1 and part 2. Critics have trouble believing this for several reasons. One is that Pistol and Shallow are introduced as new characters in Henry IV, Part 2, But in the Merry Wives their connection to Falstaff is taken for granted. Also, there are no references to any of the major events from Falstaff's 15th-century exploits from the history plays, such as the rebellion (Henry IV part 1 & 2), in Merry Wives. T.W. Craik suggests that Shakespeare was forced to interrupt work on Henry IV, part 2, having written most of it, because The Merry Wives had to be completed quickly. [7] Another possible explanation comes from the epilogue to Henry IV, Part 2 , which promises to "continue the story, with Sir John in it". Sir John does not appear in Henry V, so Merry Wives could have been written to make good on the pledge.

[8] At least parts of the play may have been written around or before the first performances of Part 1 in 1597, after which controversy over the original naming of Falstaff (he was originally the historic Sir John Oldcastle , which presumably did not please Oldcastle's descendants) forced Shakespeare to rename the character. It appears that the joke in V,v,85–90 is that Oldcastle/Falstaff incriminates himself by calling out the first letter of his name, "O, O, O!," when his fingertips are singed with candles—which of course works for "Oldcastle" but not "Falstaff." There is also the "castle" reference in IV,v,6. [9] 18 January 1602 was the date the play was entered into the Register of the Stationers Company . The first quarto was published later that year, in an inferior text, by bookseller Arthur Johnson. It was published in a second quarto in 1619, as part of William Jaggard's False Folio ; the superior First Folio text followed in 1623.

The title page of Q1 states that the play was acted by the Lord Chamberlain's Men, "Both before Her Majesty, and elsewhere." The earliest definitely dated performance occurred on 4 November 1604, at Whitehall Palace . The play is also known to have been performed on 15 November 1638, at the Cockpit in Court . Analysis and criticism A 1902 illustration done for Herbert Beerbohm Tree 's coronation revival, featuring Ellen Terry as Mistress Page, Margaret Kendal as Mistress Ford, and Tree himself as Falstaff. Most critics consider Merry Wives to be one of Shakespeare's weakest plays, and the Falstaff of Merry Wives to be much inferior to the Falstaff of the two Henry IV plays. That Shakespeare would so stumble with one of his greatest creations is puzzling and a satisfactory reason for this remains to be found. The most obvious explanation is that it was written very quickly. Leslie Hotson wrote that "it is certain that the play bears the earmarks of hasty writing." [10] Themes Key themes of Merry Wives include love and marriage, jealousy and revenge, social class and wealth.

Explored with irony , sexual innuendo , sarcasm , and stereotypical views of classes and nationalities, these themes help to give the play something closer to a modern-day view than is often found in Shakespeare's plays. The play is centred on the class prejudices of middle-class England. The lower class is represented by characters such as Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol (Falstaff's followers), and the upper class is represented by Sir John Falstaff and Master Fenton. Shakespeare uses both Latin and misused English to represent the attitudes and differences of the people of this era. For example, much humor is derived from the exaggerated accents of Dr. Caius and Sir Hugh Evans. For example, Caius speaks in an exaggerated French dialect ; when he finds out he has married a page instead of Mistress Anne he exclaims that he has married "oon garcon", and Evans speaks in a thick Welsh accent to the point that Falstaff complains that he "makes fritters of English" (5,5,135) Much of the comedic effect of the play is derived from misunderstandings between characters.

Other scholars say that the treatment of sexual jealousy in the play differs from its treatment in others, like Othello and A Winter's Tale. The jealousy of Leontes and Othello is dangerous and deep-seated, while Ford's jealousy is something to be mocked and laughed at. Performance history A scene from the original production of Verdi's Falstaff (1893) as depicted by artist Ettore Tito . Merry Wives was one of the first Shakespearean plays to be performed once the theatres re-opened in 1660 after the Interregnum . Samuel Pepys saw the King's Company act it on 6 Dec. 1660, and again in 1661 and 1667 (though he didn't like it on any occasion). In 1702 John Dennis offered an adaptation (it has been called a "perversion") of the play, titled The Comical Gallant, or the Amours of Sir John Falstaff – which flopped. In 1824 Frederick Reynolds included Merry Wives in his series of operatic adaptations, with music by Henry Bishop .

Charles Kean returned to Shakespeare's text in an 1851 production. [11] Arthur Sullivan composed incidental music for use in Act V of an 1874 production at the Gaiety Theatre, London , which was also used in the 1889 Haymarket Theatre production. [12] During the period of anti-German feelings in England during World War I, many German names and titles were changed and given more English-sounding names, including the royal family's from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha to Windsor. Kaiser Wilhelm II countered this by jokingly saying that he was off to see a performance of 'The Merry Wives of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha.' [13] Adaptations and cultural references Mistress Page (Julie Hughett) and Falstaff (John Rousseau) in The Merry Wives of Windsor, staged by Pacific Repertory Theatre at the Golden Bough Playhouse in Carmel, California, in 1999. The play was revised and adapted by John Dennis in 1702 as The Comical Gallant .

The composer Antonio Salieri wrote the opera buffa Falstaff (1799), with a libretto by Carlo Prospero Defranceschi , which also adapts the main story line of The Merry Wives of Windsor for the operatic stage. Michael William Balfe's opera, Falstaff (1838), is based on the play. The German composer Carl Otto Nicolai wrote a " singspiel " based on the comedy in 1849, Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor . The opera contains much German spoken dialogue, and many of the characters' names have been changed (the names of the Mistresses Ford and Page are now Fluth and Reich) and there is more focus given between the romance of Fenton and Anne. It is the only adaptation to include the disguising of Falstaff as a woman. Giuseppe Verdi 's last opera, Falstaff , with a libretto by Arrigo Boito , is based on the play. In this adaptation, the plot is kept largely as Shakespeare wrote it, but the story line is condensed and simplified, and there are several changes.

For example, Anne (known as Nanetta) is now the daughter of Mistress Ford, not Mistress Page, and she is betrothed by her father to Dr. Caius alone, with Mistresses Ford and Page conspiring to aid in her elopement with Fenton. The roles of Master Page, Slender, Shallow, Sir Hugh Evans, and many others are eliminated. To flesh out Falstaff's character, librettist Arrigo Boito adds material from Shakespeare's Henry IV, Parts I and II, including the famous "honor" soliloquy found in act I scene II of Henry IV Part I. It is largely considered to be the best operatic adaptation of The Merry Wives of Windsor, as well as one of opera's greatest comic achievements. The English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams wrote Sir John in Love , an opera based on this play in the years 1924–28. Much of the libretto is taken directly from Shakespeare's text, making it the most accurate of the operatic adaptations. The only version to retain all of the characters as well as the subplot of the duel between Dr. Caius and Sir Hugh Evans.

The play was adapted to Kiswahili by Joshua Ogutu and performed at the Globe Theatre in London as part of the 2012 Globe to Globe festival. For the 2012 Oregon Shakespeare Festival season, Alison Carey adapted the play into a political satire called The Very Merry Wives of Windsor, Iowa. For the 2012 Bard on the Beach season in Vancouver, Director Johnna Wright set the play in 1968 Windsor, Ontario. In an episode of Criminal Minds , "Heathridge Manor" the BAU hunts a serial killer who kills women with dresses soaked with nicotine. The BAU later discovers that the dresses were based on ones used in a local production of The Merry Wives of Windsor. Dr. Spencer Reid mentions that the face makeup used on the victims was often worn by members of the upper class and notes that The Merry Wives of Windsor was a play about the middle class. Further investigation reveals the killer's mother, a textile heiress who had a minor role in the same theater group's production of the Merry Wives of Windsor.

The killer's mother was psychotic and stabbed a fellow actress in the same play as she was under the delusion that the other actresses in the play were the Devil's wives, a delusion she passed to her son and daughter. The mother was later committed to a hospital for the criminally insane and her children began killing women they believed to be the Devil's wives, killing them with costumes based on ones from the play soaked in nicotine. Notes Famous Operas Based On Shakespeare Plays - The Horn The Horn Religious Music(Choral) Famous Operas Based On Shakespeare Plays It's interesting how many operas have been made out of Shakespeare's plays. It's hard to know how many, and a number of them are quite popular. Probably the most famous are by Giuseppe Verdi (1813- 19010.) He was a great admirer of the plays , which he knew from Italian translations only. The earliest is Macbeth, or Macbetto, which dates from the 1840s and exists in an original and revised version. It follows the original fairly closely, which not all Shakespearean operas do, and can be very exciting to hear.

It contains two juicy roles for a soprano as Lady Macbeth, and a baritone as Macbeth. Verdi did not want a conventionally beautiful voice for lady Macbeth, but one that was harsh and sinister-sounding. The sleepwalking scene is really spooky. The Metropolitan opera did a new production of Macbeth this past season, and it could be seen at High Definition movie theater broadcsts, PBS and heard over the radio. Look for it on DVD when it comes out. Otello (Othello ), is Verdi's next to last opera, and one of the most powerful and compelling operas ever written. It was premiered at the famous La Scala opera in Milan in 1887. Verdi and his librettist Arrigo Boito(who also composed the opera Mefistofele ) omit Shakespeare's first act and begin the opera with a tumultuous storm in which Otello's ship arrives in Cyprus after defeating the Ottoman navy in battle. The role of Otello is one of the most demanding tenor roles in opera, and has long been a signature role of the great Spanish tenor Placido Domingo and other famous tenors of the 20th century.

Check out the Franco Zefirrelli film version with Domingo, and the live DVD from the Met. Verdi's final opera is Falstaff, based on The Merry Wives of Windsor. He had written only one comic opera before early in his career , which is almost never performed today. The role of the fat, jolly, boozing rogue Falstaff is one of the great baritone roles. Verdi is famous for tragic operas like La Traviata, Rigoletto, and others, but Falstaff is unlike anything else by this composer. It's full of wit and enchantment. There are a number of DVD versions available. Some lesser known but worthwhile operas based on Shakespeare are "Die Lustigen Weiber von Windsor" , by the German composer Otto Nicolai (1810- 1849 ) , which is basically the same as the Merry Wives of Windsor. It's in German, and as far as I know there are no DVD versions, but it has been recorded. If not as great as Verdi's Falstaff, it's quite charming and tuneful.

Verdi wanted to write an operatic version of King Lear but never got around to it, but the contemporary German composer Aribert Reimann has written an interesting if musically very complex and difficult one , premiered in Munich in in 1978 and written for the great German baritone Dietrich Fischer -Dieskau (1925-), now retired. The live recording of the world premiere recording has recently been reissued on Deutsche Grammophon records. It's anything but easy listening, but worth getting to know. The gifted young English composer Thomas Ades (A-dess) (1971), has written very recent version of the Tempest, which I have not heard. The composer conducted the world premiere at the Royal opera in London a few years ago, and the Metropolitan opera is scheduled to do it in a couple of years or so. It sounds interesting. The French composer Ambroise Thomas , an almost exact contemporary of Verdi, is little known today, but his operatic version of Hamlet was once very popular. Unfortunately, the opera takes many liberties with Shakespeare's plotline.

I have heard the EMI recording with the famous American baritone Thomas Hampson, but this may not be availabe at the time. Check arkivmusic.com. I believe there is at least one DVD version. If not one of the greatest operas, it's very entertaining. Verdi's 'Falstaff' : NPR Email March 15, 20071:55 PM ET Decked out as the "Black Hunstman," Bryn Terfel's Falstaff is about to get the surprise of his life from friends who are tired of his arrogant antics. Brett Coomer/Houston Grand Opera hide caption toggle caption Brett Coomer/Houston Grand Opera At age 79, composer Giuseppe Verdi caused a sensation with Falstaff, the first comic opera he had written in more than 50 years. Getty Images hide caption toggle caption Getty Images Falstaff thinks he's at the mercy of mysterious woodland 'spirits,' in the final scene of Verdi's Falstaff.

Brett Coomer/Houston Grand Opera hide caption toggle caption Brett Coomer/Houston Grand Opera BACKGROUND: You may be familiar with Sir John Falstaff from a trio of dramas by Shakespeare: Parts 1 and 2 of Henry IV, and The Merry Wives of Windsor. Even so, you'll find that the roly-poly knight takes on even more vitality in Verdi's final opera. The score is overflowing with wit and revelry, and brims with insights into human nature. Verdi was famous for his love of Shakespeare, and already had Macbeth and Otello under his belt when, while in his late 70s, he was casting about for the subject of a new opera – this time a comedy. It was his friend and librettist Arrigo Boito who suggested The Merry Wives of Windsor. Boito worked up a rough draft, Verdi loved it, and by 1890 the two had completed Falstaff. It had its premiere at La Scala in 1893. ACT ONE: The opera is set in Windsor, England, in the early 15th century, during the reign of Henry IV.

Verdi immediately signals the comic nature of the work with an oddly off-beat C-major chord. From then on, the action is fast and furious. We meet Sir John Falstaff sitting in the Garter Inn, with a pair of scruffy companions, Bardolph and Pistol. All three are knights who have seen better days. Falstaff is putting two letters into envelopes. Nobody has the money to pay the bar bill, and Falstaff reveals his plan to improve their financial situation. His envelopes contain love letters addressed to two wealthy, married women, Alice Ford and Meg Page. Seduce one of them, he thinks – or maybe both of them – and his money troubles are history. Falstaff wants Bardolph and Pistol to deliver the letters, but they refuse, citing dubious ethical concerns. Falstaff rails against his buddies, chases them from the inn, and gives his letters to a messenger. In the following scene, Alice Ford and her daughter Nannetta are in their garden talking to Meg Page and Mistress Quickly. When Alice and Meg discover they've received identical letters from Falstaff they know he's up to something, and decide to get even. As the women leave, Mr. Ford arrives with Dr.

Caius, Fenton, Bardolph, and Pistol. They all warn Ford about Falstaff's designs. Fenton seeks out Nannetta, his secret lover, and the two steal kisses. The other women return, with a plot to send Mistress Quickly to Falstaff to arrange a rendezvous with Alice. Meanwhile, Ford also has a scheme to get back at Falstaff. In the Act One finale, both the men and women are determined to cut the fat knight down to size. ACT TWO: Falstaff is back at the Garter Inn. Mistress Quickly arrives and assures Falstaff that both Alice and Meg return his affections. After arranging a meeting with Alice, Falstaff gives Quickly a puny tip, then prances and preens for everyone, anticipating his amorous conquest. Ford enters, disguised as "Master Brook." He says he's also in love with Alice, but she won't give him the time of day. Falstaff brags about his imminent assignation with Alice. Ford is furious, but pulls himself together and he and Falstaff leave arm in arm. At Ford's house, Mistress Quickly tells Alice and Meg about her meeting with Falstaff.

Just before Falstaff arrives, the women hide — except for Alice, who sits strumming a lute. Falstaff begins to brag about his youth, when he was a handsome, slender thing. He's cut short when Quickly arrives to announce that Meg is coming. Falstaff jumps behind a dressing screen to hide. Meg brings news that Ford is on the way, and he's angry. When Ford gets there, he and his men search the house and a panicky Falstaff jumps into a basket of dirty laundry. Ford hears something behind the screen and knocks it over, but finds only Fenton and Nannetta, in a lustful embrace. When the searchers move to other parts of the house, Alice orders her servants to dump the laundry basket out the window and into the Thames. As the act ends Falstaff is seen ignominiously blubbering in the water, and everyone gets a good laugh at his expense. ACT THREE: As the action resumes we find Falstaff — where else? — back at the Garter Inn, drinking. He's wailing about his humiliating adventure when Mistress Quickly turns up. She insists that Alice Ford really is in love with him.

To prove it, she produces a note from Alice suggesting a midnight tryst in the woods of Windsor Park, under the big oak tree. The note says Falstaff should come in disguise, dressed as the Black Huntsman whose ghost reportedly haunts those woods. Quickly regales Falstaff with spooky tales of the Huntsman while Alice, Ford, Meg, Caius, and Fenton sneak in. They make a plot to scare Falstaff by dressing up as strange creatures and woodland spirits. Ford then comes up with a plot of his own, to marry Nannetta off to Dr. Caius – anything to keep her away from Fenton – but Quickly overhears him. The final scene is in the moonlit forest. Fenton is disguised as a monk, Nannetta as queen of the fairies, Meg as a nymph, and Quickly as a witch. They all scatter when Falstaff comes tromping in wearing his ridiculous Huntsman getup, complete with a full set of antlers. Just as he greets Alice, Meg – the nymph – mysteriously warns them of approaching demons. Falstaff shudders and cowers, while Nannetta summons the forest creatures.

They emerge from the woods, prodding, poking and pinching Falstaff, who finally is so undone that he drops to the ground and begs for mercy. Then, he recognizes Bardolph behind one of the masks, and the others also reveal themselves. Falstaff is briefly confused, then comes out with booming laugh. He may be a braggart and a cheat, but he does have a healthy sense of humor. Ford proposes to celebrate the betrothal of the Queen of the Fairies – Nannetta – thinking he's about to bless her union with Caius. At that, Alice brings forward two brides and two grooms, all still in disguise. Without knowing what he's actually doing, Ford pledges his daughter Nannetta to her lover Fenton, and Caius finds himself engaged to Bardolph! Ford realizes he's been tricked, but still gives his blessing.

In the finale, Falstaff leads the entire company in declaring, "All the world is a joke." A Worthy Contender: Nicolai's 'The Merry Wives of Windsor' A Worthy Contender: Nicolai's 'The Merry Wives of Windsor' Audio selections Usually, when an opera becomes a lasting hit, it's good news for all concerned -- and especially for its composer, or at least for the composer's legacy. Yet there are times when it becomes a "good news, bad news" situation -- good for one composer, but bad for another. For example, there's Puccini's La Boheme, a score that quickly became one of the most popular operas of all time. That was good news for Puccini, but decidedly bad news for one of his distinguished contemporaries. While Puccini was writing La Boheme, Ruggero Leoncavallo was hard at work on his own version of the story. It never had a chance. Leoncavallo's Boheme was overshadowed, almost from the start, by the wild success of Puccini's opera. Something similar happened, more belatedly, to no less a composer than Gioachino Rossini.

His Otello, with roots in the famous tragedy by Shakespeare, is a brilliant opera. Decades later, when Verdi came along with his own Otello, Rossini's version fell by the wayside. It may be the story of those two operas that best illustrates the fate of Otto Nicolai's The Merry Wives of Windsor. Nicolai was born in the then-German city of Koenigsberg -- now Kaliningrad -- and his background, and his music, ultimately identified him as a German composer. Yet, at first, his ambitions were quite different. Nicolai's early operas were in Italian and one of the, Enrico II, was a modest hit in Vienna. So Nicolai moved to Italy, hoping to parlay that success into a lasting career in Italian opera houses. It didn't work out for him. In the longer run, it seems Nicolai's talent -- or at least his judgment -- wasn't right for Italian opera. At one point, he turned down a libretto called "Nabucco," ridiculing the story and saying it wasn't fit for opera.

It was picked up by another ambitious young composer, Giuseppe Verdi, whose success with Nabucco made him a star. That didn't sit well with Nicolai, who described Verdi as a "pitiful, despicable composer," and called his operas "really horrible." Well, nobody's right all the time! Given that history, it may be just as well that Nicolai didn't live to witness the ultimate fate of The Merry Wives of Windsor, his only German opera. Based on the Shakespeare play, the opera premiered successfully in Berlin in 1849, and is still popular in Germany today. Elsewhere, though, the opera's reputation is less glossy -- thanks, at least in part, to Verdi. Nicolai's Merry Wives is based on the same story Verdi set, more than 40 years later, in Falstaff. That's a work now hailed not just as a great operatic comedy, but as one of the greatest operas of all time. So, when opera lovers hear the name Falstaff, it's Verdi's masterpiece that immediately comes to mind. Still, Nicolai's opera deserves better.

It was among the most successful of all operas during the first half of the 19th century -- a time that also found Rossini, Bellini, and Donizetti hard at work. And that success was well earned. Nicolai's music has a depth of feeling that effectively conveys the inherent wisdom of Shakespeare's original -- along with an ebullient, infectious charm that goes hand in hand with the playwright's brilliant comedy. On World of Opera, host Lisa Simeone presents The Merry Wives of Windsor from the Liège Opera in Belgium, starring bass Franz Hawlata as Falstaff, along with soprano Anneke Luyten and mezzo-soprano Sabina Willeit as Alice Ford and Meg Page -- the Merry \Wives -- in a production led by conductor Christian Zacharias.

Social sharing Giuseppe Verdi - Biography - IMDb Giuseppe Verdi Jump to: Overview (4) | Mini Bio (1) | Spouse (2) | Trivia (4) Overview (4) Il Sovrano Mini Bio (1) Giuseppe Verdi was born Giuseppe Fortunino Francesco Verdi on October 10, 1813, in Le Roncole di Busseto, Parma, Italy. His parents were landowners and innkeepers. Young Verdi received his first organ lessons at the age of 7. He studied composition privately with Ferdinando Provesi in Busseto. At age 20 he moved to Milan to continue his studies, but the Conservatory of Music rejected him. Verdi took private lessons and associated with Milan's cultural milieu in his pursuit of a musical career. He was patronized by Antonio Barezzi, a merchant, whose daughter, Margherita, was Verdi's student and later became his wife. His first opera, Oberto (1839), was a successful production by Milan's Theatro La Scala. While Verdi continued working on his second opera, his wife and two children died.

The second opera failed, and he suffered a depression and vowed to quit musical career. La Scala impresario, Merelli, persuaded him to write a third opera. Nabucco (1842) made Verdi famous. He followed the Bel Canto style of Gaetano Donizetti and Vincenzo Bellini . Verdi's best operas were based on plays by Victor Hugo , such as 'Ernani' (1844) and 'Rigoletto' (1851). In 1853 Verdi 's masterpiece 'La Traviata' was produced in Venice. It was based on 'The Lady of the Camelias', a play by Alexandre Dumas, fils. At that time Verdi became familiar with the music of Russian composer Mikhail Glinka who was popularized in Europe by Franz Liszt . The music of Mikhail Glinka had certain influence on Verdi's later operas. In 1861 Verdi wrote 'La forza del destino' commissioned by the Imperial Theatre in St. Petersburg, Russia, upon the recommendations by Aleksandr Borodin .

It was performed with great success in 1862, and became part of a standard operatic repertoire ever since. His grand-opera 'Aida' (1871) was premiered in Cairo as part of the celebrations of the opening of the Suez Canal, and became an instant success. In his later operas Verdi turned from the style of Bel Canto to more expressive music and orchestration, like in 'Otello' (1887), based on the eponymous play by Shakespeare. Verdi's last and musically most brilliant, rich and expressive opera, 'Falstaff' (1893), was based on the Shakespeare's play "The Merry Wives of Windsor" in the adaptation of Victor Hugo . Verdi's musical success coincided with the political events of Italian unification during the Austrian occupation. The 'Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves' from his opera 'Nabucco' (1842), became a popular song among supporters of Italian unification. Many of his opera performances were used by the supporters of Victor Emmanuel to shout "Viva Verdi" as a code name for a secret unification message.

The name Verdi was used as acronym for "Vittorio Emanuele Re D'Italia" - Victor Emmanuel, King of Italy. Such a code enabled clandestine partisans of Victor Emmanuel, then the King of Sardinia, to gain more supporters in Milan which eventually led to the unification of Italy. Verdi was aware that his popular operas and his name was used as a political tool. Austrian censorship was powerless. In 1861 Victor Emmanuel became the King of Italy in Turin. From 1861-1865 Giuseppe Verdi was elected representative of Busseto in the newly formed Italian parliament. After Garibaldi's military campaign the capital was moved to Florence, then to Rome, and Verdi returned from politics to music. He lived in Milan during the last years of his life. He was revered and honoured all over the world, and was much visited by his admirers. He died on January 27, 1901, in Milan, and was laid to rest at the Casa di Riposo, a retirement home for elderly musicians that was established by Verdi himself. Verdi's music was used in hundreds of film scores.

His operas has been the staples of operatic repertoire. His canzonas "La donna è mobile" from opera 'Rigoletto' (1851) and "Libiamo ne'lieti calici" (Drinking song) from 'La Traviata' (1853) has been popular concert numbers in performances by the three tenors: Luciano Pavarotti , Plácido Domingo and José Carreras . - IMDb Mini Biography By: Steve Shelokhonov Spouse (2) Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor… | Details | AllMusic google+ Description by Joseph Stevenson Otto Nicolai (1810 - 1848) became one of the few "one-hit wonders" among classical composers. Although some of his operas had success during his lifetime, it is really only his final opera, The Merry Wives of Windsor, that has become a repertory item, and then for the most part only in German-speaking countries. This tuneful and lighthearted overture is probably the only Nicolai music that most people have heard. Nicolai was born in Königsberg, a German city so far east that it is now part of Russia.

He revered Mozart and sought to emulate his elegance, clarity of form, and novelty of orchestration. After studies in Berlin, he went on to Italy, where he learned much about vocal music, the great polyphonic pieces of the Renaissance, and the new bel canto operatic style of Bellini and Donizetti . After achieving initial success in Italy, Nicolai made his career in Vienna, where in 1842 he became the founding conductor of what was then called the Philharmonic Concert Orchestra. His earlier opera Il templario had gained him success in several countries. Seeking a subject for his first opera originally in German, he resisted the idea of attempting a Shakespeare setting, but eventually did begin this opera based on the play of the same name. His aim, he wrote, was to continue the German operatic tradition, "...but Italian lightness must be added." He is far from the only composer to write an opera on the subject of the fat knight, Sir John Falstaff, and the comeuppance he gets from a pair of bourgeois wives when he tries to seduce them.

The most famous of at least ten operas on the subject is Verdi 's Falstaff, with Vaughan Williams ' Sir John in Love probably coming in third place after the Nicolai work. Nicolai was crushed when the Court Opera of Vienna rejected it. He took the job of conductor of the Berlin Royal Opera in 1847, along with receiving an invitation to play the opera there. It was a rousing success from its first performance, March 9, 1849. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage on May 11, 1849. The overture is about eight minutes long. Almost a third of it is a slow, melodic introduction, which perhaps suggests the broad landscape the Thames-side town of Windsor. One of the two main melodies of the overture becomes associated later in the opera with Mrs. Page, and a heavy-footed subsidiary theme surely standing for Falstaff. The music is unfailingly bright and bubbling, without doubt the best comic opera overture by a Germanic composer since Mozart .

Appears On Shakespeareances.com: Shakespeare Opera Theatre's Merry Wives of Windsor and Falstaff The Merry Wives of Windsor/Falstaff An Aria in Praise of the Fat Knight Falstaff score by Giuseppe Verdi, libretto by Arrigo Boito (English version by W. Beatty Kingston) Shakespeare Opera Theatre , Hylton Performing Arts Center, Manassas, Virginia Sunday, April 24, 2016, third row center in 242-seat studio theater The Merry Wives of Windsor directed by Brittany Martz; Falstaff directed and conducted by Lori Lind The cast of Falstaff (and a couple members of The Merry Wives of Windsor cast) in a promo photo for the Shakespeare Opera Theatre. The company is playing Shakespeare's play and Verdi's opera in repertoire. Photo by Kenneth Garrett, Shakespeare Opera Theatre. This was such a unique repertoire we couldn't help take notice: William Shakespeare's play The Merry Wives of Windsor with Giuseppe Verdi's opera Falstaff. The aptly named Shakespeare Opera Theatre in Manassas, Virginia, is the brainchild of professional opera singer Lori Lind.

Serving as both artistic and executive director, Lind founded Shakespeare Opera Theatre on the "dream of bringing theater and opera together to explore Shakespeare's peerless masterpieces." In its inaugural season last year, the company paired Much Ado About Nothing with Hector Berlioz's Béatrice and Bénédict. The company's marketing director, baritone Gregory Scott Stuart, who plays Ford in Merry Wives and Bardolfo in Falstaff, offers up a slightly more subversive mission statement: "To make opera lovers out of Shakespeare lovers, and Shakespeare lovers out of opera lovers." Based on the current repertoire, the Shakespeare Opera Theatre has the goods to accomplish the former but a ways to go on the latter. Falstaff, with a seven-piece ensemble to one side of the stage, is well sung and grandly staged, especially the Windsor woods finale with fairies and nymphs. Merry Wives, on the other hand, lurches along with a mostly inexperienced company and a director who works from the premise that her audience is scared of Shakespeare. Saving the production is G. Michael Harris as one of the greatest Falstaffs I've ever seen.

The cast list for The Merry Wives of Windsor leads off with "Lecturer," played by Stuart. He introduces the play and the circumstances of its composition, including the legend that Queen Elizabeth gave Shakespeare two weeks to write a play about Falstaff falling in love. The Lecturer also gives us a bit of background on the play's place in the canon and how some scholars label it Shakespeare's worst piece. This apparently is intended to ease our fears, though there's much irony in Directory Brittany Martz leading off the play in this manner, given the first two sentences that lead off her director's note: "As strange as it seems to me, 'Shakespeare' is a word that can often send dread through people's hearts. Upon hearing it, many are transported back to their high school English classes." And here is Lecturer doing just that at the opening of this play. It doesn't stop there. Stuart returns between scenes to continue his lecture, and as Falstaff and Mistress Ford begin their first tryst, the Lecturer pops his head out and says to the audience, "Is this what the queen wanted to see?" Some of what he says is bizarre, too.

He discusses the difference between prose and verse in the lines, notes that 87 percent of Falstaff's lines are in prose while Hamlet spoke prose 27 percent of the time, and suggests that Shakespeare liked Hamlet 73 percent more than Falstaff. Is the math even right? The logic certainly isn't. And then, with a wink to the audience, Stuart begins playing Ford. He's fine as Ford, but every time he comes on stage, we brace for another lecture and relax only when we are certain he's Ford. Furthermore, taken collectively, the Lecturer's pontifications seem to be emphasizing the denigration this play gets, and at the end he puts it to us to decide if the play is really good or not—always a dangerous move with a cast that is obviously relatively new to Shakespeare. Though the cast is eager to please, most of the actors engage in overwrought facial expressions, air-sawing with hands, and blocking that keeps everybody on the move over a large, unfocused stage (despite being a studio theater). It's dizzying.

Mistress Ford and Mistress Page are constantly snickering with each other, so pleased are they with the jokes they are playing on Falstaff and Ford, but it becomes a distractive leitmotif as the play runs its course. The production's biggest laughs come when Caroline Dubberly as Alice Ford plays out Hern the Hunter while Meg Page (Kathryn Katsikis) describes the mythical character: Dubberly shows off great physical skills with her angular-armed, tongue-waggling, eye-popping performance here, but it visually drowns out what we are hearing from Mistress Page. Martz has the nice idea of putting a rack of costumes at the back of the stage and we see actors replacing cloaks as they change characters. But scene transitions take too long, partly due to poor pacing, partly due to the production playing the entire horizontal space available (perhaps one issue that needs to be addressed in staging plays in repertoire with opera is reconciling spatial needs). Some acting choices also have mixed results. CJ David is a manic Pistol, as physically over the top as the dialogue Shakespeare wrote for the character from his first appeareance in Henry IV, Part Two through Merry Wives to Henry V.

David's intense portrayal is fitting and funny. Meanwhile, Kelsey Painter as Nym matches Pistol tic for tic in physicality, and I'm not sure that fits the "humors" of Nym, especially as the two actors together create a Pistol-Nym pair as visually energetic as two tornadoes bearing down on us. At least the two actors pick up the nuanced humor in their roles and give us a fun comedy duo, too, and Painter further demonstrates her acting chops with her steadily serious take on Fenton (David's double dose of talent manifests later). These merry wives are merry only with each other. In general company and with her husband, Dubberly's Mistress Ford is a scowling bitch. Certainly, the part has some holier-than-thee elements, but what obvious acting skills Dubberly has is buried in her character's histrionics. That, though, is in keeping with the extremist tone of the entire production. Molly Pinson Simoneau, for example, plays Shallow as an aggressively leering old man, getting so hands-on (or cane-on) with young Anne Page (Charlotte Blacklock) as to be criminal.

It gets laughs from some in the audience, but when Shallow casts a creepier specter on the women in the play than Falstaff does, you've sent your production into the shoals. Except that Harris single-handedly steers it into more pleasant waters, and he does it with a perfectly understated performance of the fat knight. He "has been physically preparing for Falstaff for most of the past decade," he writes in his bio. This admission, though, goes to the heart of his portrayal of Falstaff as a man I know well in real life: my college roommate; a couple of guys who have sat behind us at ball games; a couple of coworkers I've known; and guys standing in queues, dining at adjacent tables at restaurants, or sitting somewhere within earshot on the train. He's gregarious, he's full of himself (and there's a lot of himself to fill), he is overflowing in charm and absent of tact, and he has a misaligned moral compass, but he's funny. And in that funny, he's likeable. It's notable that all those Falstaffs I listed in real life are usually surrounded by friends, though they are annoying to the rest of us.

In Henry IV, Part One, Falstaff describes himself as "sweet Jack Falstaff," and Harris captures that self-image without ever undermining the scoundrel Falstaff really is. In his portrayal, Harris peaks with Falstaff's description of being carried in a laundry basket and dumped in the Thames along with the "greeeeeeasy napkins." "What I have suffered to bring this woman to evil," Falstaff says, and Harris delivers this line so matter-of-factly it tickles. And the play's most unusual line, "Let the sky rain potatoes," Harris turns into a celebration of what he imagines would be the greatest miracles a man can behold: two women at the same time and food pouring from the heavens. It is an exquisite Falstaff that Harris presents. Harris also plays well with others. The only Equity member of the cast, he obviously strives to create an ensemble (you see it in the curtain call), and thus he develops a sweet pairing with Bradyn Heck as Mistress Quickly (Heck doubles as Slender, a fine performance, though his climbing on the back of his servant, Simple, in their opening scene together makes no sense). In this production, there's no doubt that Falstaff and Quickly become lovers.

Nerissa Hart also earns kudos for her performance as Dr. Caius, clipping off her lines commandingly, snapping her fingers at her servant John Rugby (Blacklock), and channeling her physical energies into stiff poses of resolve as opposed to overblown movements. Hart doubles as Bardolph, doing her duties as tapster in the inn with sour grapes in her demeanor. I have less to say about Verdi's Falstaff though there is more to value in that production (which is sung in English). It comes down to my qualifications to assess. While I've seen well over 400 Shakespeare stage productions, including 10 Merry Wives, this was my fourth live opera and first Falstaff, though I grew up with parents who loved opera and played it often (and loud—I could never play the Who so loud as my dad played Wagner). Most of the principals in this Falstaff are in good voice, with special notice to Jennifer Sin as Nannetta Page and CJ David as Fenton—yes, the manic Pistol of that afternoon's Merry Wives becomes the romantic Fenton in Falstaff. His and Sin's voices blend beautifully in the duets, which is one of the musical highlights of Verdi's score.

Another is the last act in Windsor Woods, gorgeously introduced with a measure of French horn and woodwinds. Under Lind's conducting, the seven-piece ensemble manages to create an orchestral quality equal to the score's grandeur. The Shakespearean highlight of Verdi's last masterpiece is the title character, sung by Kevin Rockower. I don't know if he and Harris combined on character notes, but Rockower gives us a Falstaff similar to Harris's in easy temperament and casual demeanor. There's nothing overblown about his performance—even though this is opera. Falstaff and Quickly (a delightful Natalie Naudus) are an item in the opera, too, even getting a duet in which he proudly proclaims, "She's mine, she's mine" (and afterward sings a triumphant aria about how all women lust for him). Although Verdi's librettist, Arrigo Boito, based the opera on the plot and characters of The Merry Wives of Windsor, he incorporates some passages from the Henry IV plays, too, including Falstaff's "honor" soliloquy, which he sings here in response to Bardolph and Pistol (Stuart and Phillip K.

Bullock, respectively, both doing masterful work) refusing to carry Falstaff's letters to Mistresses Ford and Page on account of their honor. The juxtapositions are notable: in Henry IV, Part One, Falstaff's meditation on honor is in the context of an upcoming battle; here, it's in the context of a company of thieves. Falstaff's speech on sack from Henry IV, Part Two, also makes it into Verdi's opera, and there's nothing quite so uplifting as hearing Falstaff sing an aria to booze. No wonder Falstaff has so many friends. Eric Minton Reader response: Dear Mr. Minton, Like you, I grew up in an opera-loving family. Not only that, I was a backstage brat. My mother and paternal grandmother were both operatic divas. My grandmother, Luisa Ardizzoni Tosi, was an international star in the Caruso era. She was my mother's teacher in Boston. Giuseppe Verdi—who famously revered the Bard—first introduced me to Shakespeare.

I knew Verdi's Macbeth and his late masterpieces Otello and Falstaff well before I knew how to spell iambic pentameter, or realized that "Othello" wasn't a misspelling of "Otello." I didn't stumble into the world of Shakespeare's plays until I was a teen. As an Italianate kid, one of the first things I noticed was how many of them led back to Italy: Romeo and Juliet, The Merchant of Venice, Two Gentlemen From Verona, etc. So began a romance—a cross-pollination—that enriches my life, particularly as a writer wandering wide-eyed along the many Shakespearean pathways into art, literature, and music. Thus, I have the Bard and Verdi to thank for Ophelia Rising, my fictional biography of the fair maiden's life before and after Hamlet. Actually, I should also thank French composer Ambroise Thomas because the idea for that novel first occurred to my after leaving a dreadful performance of Thomas' ponderous, romantic grand opera Hamlet (which he should have entitled Ophelia) in San Francisco.

The performance didn't stick with me, but the idea kept percolating until I finally sat down wrote the book, and a sequel on which I am currently at work. Umberto Tosi

Question: Which composer wrote the opera 'Falstaff', based on the Shakespeare play 'The Merry wives of Windsor'?
Answer: (Guiseppe) VERDI