The Consul

John Sorel fights the state underground to defend his ideal of freedom. To do this, he is prepared to give up his wife Magda, their child and his mother. Magda wants to follow John into exile and applies to the consulate for a visa for herself and her family. But the process is blocked by bureaucratic obstacles; Magda is never admitted by the consul. While John's supposed fight for freedom condemns his family to ruin, Magda refuses to face up to reality and acknowledge the dark lies of her life. The result is an accident where Magda and John's son dies, finally leading to disaster for the entire family.

An opera about the desperate wait for a visa - Gian Carlo Menotti's 1950 work Consul could not be more topical. The fate of Magda Sorel and her family shows how individuals fall apart as a result of destructive political activism and an inhuman bureaucracy. Menotti's urgent appeal for more compassion and humanity is the opera for our times.