Cork contingent to the fore in Irish National Opera's production of Werther 

Directed by Sophie Motley of the Everyman, Werther also features Leeside soprano Niamh O’Sullivan

Werther director Sophie Motley and soprano Niamh O’Sullivan.

It is the year of the French for Irish National Opera. Following on from the production of Rossini’s Guillaume Tell, the spring touring production presents Jules Massenet’s opera, Werther.

Scratch the surface of Massenet’s 19th century morbid hit and its German provenance is revealed. The libretto is based on Goethe’s first novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther. It seems surprising that the scandal-ridden bestseller published in 1774 wasn’t pounced on by the German operatic brigade with their penchant for overwrought Romantic plots. The text based on Goethe’s own experience of unrequited love, did not get an operatic makeover until more than a century after its publication.