It metaphorically refers back to Dante Alighieri’s Divine Comedy in the new premiere production of Giacomo Puccini’s Trittico in director Pier Francesco Maestrini’s vision and conductor Roberto Abbado’s interpretation.

The director’s idea of juxtaposing Puccini’s three one-acts with the three cantiches of the Divine Comedy – Inferno, Purgatorio, Paradiso – stems precisely from one of the composer’s own very first projects for his Trittico, later shelved while maintaining a direct Dante reference only in Gianni Schicchi. There remains, however, according to Maestrini, “this idea with the damned souls in Tabarro, with the souls awaiting redemption in Suor Angelica, with the stroke of genius of the ‘heavenly’ Schicchi. It is certainly no coincidence,” the director explains, “that a good part of the third title that makes up the trilogy is written in endecasyllables, or when Suor Angelica appears and sings ‘I desideri sono i fior dei vivi, non fioriscon nel regno delle morte…’ it refers back to St. Benedict’s prayer in Paradise.

Among the visual references in the staging-which features sets designed by Nicolás Boni, costumes by Stefania Scaraggi and lighting by Daniele Naldi-stands out the one to Gustave Doré’s illustrations for the Divine Comedy, “which moreover,” Maestrini continues, “have influenced so much cinema, including that Beyond Dreams which I would say is my main reference for this Triptych.