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The Marriage of Figaro (view source)
Revision as of 23:36, December 23, 2009
, 23:36, December 23, 2009→Act II
===Act II===
===Act II===
The act begins with the Countess alone in her chamber, lamenting her husband's unfaitfulness. Susanna (who is the Countess's maid) enters to console her. Figaro joins them, telling of his plan to keep the Count occupied with phony anonymous letters warning him of plots by other men to seduce the Countess; he has aleady given one such letter to Basilio.
Cherubino comes in, shirking military duty (at Figaro's suggestion) by asking Susanna and the Countess to dress him as a girl. After noticing that the Count's military dispatch was not officially signed, they are unable to finish dressing Cherubino, as Almaviva suddenly knocks on the door. Cherubino hides in the closet with Susanna and Rosina lets the Count in. He hears a noise coming from the closet, and demands the Countess open it, but she insists it's only Susanna trying on her wedding dress. Susanna sneaks into the room, and the Count suspiciously insists again that Rosina unlock the closet. When she refuses, he forces her to go with him to another room to fetch his key, taking the precaution of locking all of the doors first.
Meanwhile, Cherubino comes out of hiding, and jumps out the window to avoid being caught. Susanna goes back in the closet before the Count and Countess return. Very nervous about Cherubino's fate, Rosina begs for Almaviva's understanding. Growing more furious, he curses his wife's unfaithfulness and opens the door, only to find Susanna there as promised. Once the tables are turned, the Countess is able to feign offense at her husband's inability to trust her, and the two women taunt him further in his guilt as he asks for forgiveness. Returning to the subject of the anonymous letter, the women inform him that Figaro had written it.
Figaro enters and wishes to begin the wedding preparations, but the Count still wants to ask him about the note. Susanna successfully telegraphs to Figaro that the Count knows already. Just then, the gardener enters, drunk, complaining that someone destroyed the flower bushes just outside the window. Figaro pretends it had been he, but then the gardener produces the military dispatch that Cherubino had apparently dropped. Picking up the women's telegraphing again, and without missing a beat, Figaro explains that he kept the dispatch as Cherubino left for military service, as the Count had forgotten to sign it. This problem solved, Bartolo and Marcellina enter, claiming that Figaro has a pending contract to marry her. The Count happily postpones the wedding while the matter is looked into.
===Act III===
===Act III===
===Act IV===
===Act IV===