TOSCA

florida grand opera

February 2008

SET DESIGN | Andrew Horn

LIGHTING DESIGN | Kendall Smith

CONDUCTOR | Stewart Robertson

CAST | Elizabeth Blancke-Biggs | David Pittsinger | Roger Honeywell

PHOTOGRAPHY | Deborah Gray Mitchell

The Miami Herald | Lawrence A. Johnson | February 2008

“An acclaimed Tosca, soprano Catherine Malfitano made a remarkably successful transition in her local debut as stage director. One of the finest opera actors of our time, Malfitano consistently drew potent performances and dramatic conviction from the cast, not from extraneous stage business but out of the characters’ primary emotions and desperate situations. Time and again, Malfitano moved the action with natural, effective blocking, and the performance was alive with small but telling touches; Scarpia hypocritically kissing the priest’s cassock, his ballet-like seduction of Tosca, and Scarpia’s thugs beating Cavaradossi after his revolutionary outburst.”

Coral Gables Gazette | Rex Alan Hearn | February 2008

“This subtle, elegant production of Tosca, under the brilliant direction of Catherine Malfitano, is the third opera in FGO’s current season. It is a must see for opera lovers. [Her] direction was taught [sic], sensitive and detailed. Bits of stage business, original to my eye, were culled from her years of singing in this opera, no doubt.”