Video on demand: L'occasione fa il ladro

During a storm, Count Alberto loses his suitcase. It is found by Don Parmenione who, discovering a portrait of Alberto’s fiancée Berenice inside, sees an opportunity. He slips into the count’s clothes and sets off to visit Berenice who, at this point, has not yet seen her fiancé. What Parmenione doesn’t know is that Berenice has decided to watch her intended from a safe distance at first, and to this end she and her friend Ernestina have changed places. While Parmenione is wooing the woman he thinks is Berenice, the real Alberto arrives. Initially shocked to find he suddenly has a rival, he is soon charmed by the woman pretending to be his fiancée’s friend. Deception may yet lead the way to true love...

Gioachino Rossini composed the one-act opera L’occasione fa il ladro (Opportunity Makes a Thief) in 1812 - according to some in less than two weeks - and it already contains everything that characterises his later works: barnstorming ensembles, moving and virtuoso arias, comical instrumental effects and the composer’s first storm music. But behind the turbulent plot of L’occasione fa il ladro lie questions of identity theft, social role-playing and the universally human quest to find oneself. In MusikTheater an der Wien’s acclaimed production at the Kammeroper, Marcos Darbyshire directs this comedy of fourfold mistaken identities with a superb young cast.

Recorded on 07.10.2025