Tune in on Saturday, May 30 at 1 p.m. to hear the season finale of The Metropolitan Opera’s 2025-26 season of live Saturday matinee broadcasts. This will be the network premiere of a vibrant new opera by Gabriela Lena Frank, who won a Pulitzer Prize earlier this month for her symphonic fable Picaflor.
Frank’s opera, with a libretto by Nilo Cruz, is titled El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego (“The Last Dream of Frida and Diego”). It imagines a reunion between the Mexican artists Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, whose turbulent, passionate love affair Frank has compared to the one between Hollywood icons Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton.
The music and production of El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego both draw inspiration from Day of the Dead traditions in Mexican folklore. Mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard stars as Kahlo, and baritone Carlos Álvarez portrays Diego. Soprano Gabriella Reyes plays Catrina, a guardian of the dead. German countertenor Nils Wanderer makes his network broadcast debut as an actor named Leonardo. Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts the Met Orchestra and Chorus.
For more information about the opera, read this story from NPR Music.
Cast:
- Isabel Leonard as Frida Kahlo
- Carlos Álvarez as Diego Rivera
- Gabriella Reyes as Catrina
- Nils Wanderer as Leonardo
Directed by Deborah Colker
Conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin