The Versailles Royal Opera makes its home in one of history’s most famous settings: the Palace of Versailles. Just 12 miles outside Paris, the grand estate houses a strikingly beautiful concert hall completed for King Louis XV in 1770, once the largest performance venue in Europe.
So it’s only fitting that the esteemed opera company, embarking on its first U.S.tour this summer, would want to play somewhere with comparable beauty for its North American debut.
The Versailles Royal Opera is slated to bring its acclaimed production of Gaetano Donizetti’s “La Fille du Régiment” to Charles Krug Winery in St. Helena on Friday, July 18. The evening is expected to be one of the highlights of this year’s Festival Napa Valley, which kicked off on July 5 and continues through July 20, with classical concerts, film screenings and more at various Wine Country locales.
But it’s not just opulence that connects Versailles and Napa. Stage director Jean-Romain Vesperini, who mounted “Fille” in France this spring, was referred to the historic company for this production by Festival Napa Valley’s co-founder, vice president and director of artistic planning, Charles Letourneau…