Anna Netrebko and Piotr Beczala in the New Production of Massenet's Manon, Conducted by Fabio Luisi, on THIRTEEN's Great Performances at the Met Sunday, August 5 at 12 p.m. on PBS

Laurent Pelly's staging, also starring Paulo Szot as Lescaut, premieres in New York on THIRTEEN at 12:30 p.m. with a repeat Thursday, August 9 at 8:30 p.m.

NEW YORK, July 2, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Star soprano Anna Netrebko sings her first Met performances of the title role in Manon, Massenet's opera about a country girl with conflicting desires for love and luxury who is drawn into a life of glamorous -- but hollow -- Parisian sophistication.

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Manon airs on THIRTEEN's Great Performances at the Met Sunday, August 5 at 12 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). In New York, THIRTEEN will broadcast the opera at 12:30 p.m. that day, with a primetime encore the following Thursday, August 9 at 8:30 p.m.

Piotr Beczala co-stars as the Chevalier des Grieux, a young nobleman who falls in love with Manon; Paulo Szot sings the role of Lescaut, Manon's protective cousin who struggles with temptations of his own; and David Pittsinger sings the Comte des Grieux, who wants his son out of Manon's arms and into a respectable future.

Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi leads Massenet's passionate opera for the first time at the Met, in a stylish new production by Laurent Pelly.  

Pelly's staging of Manon, a success when it premiered at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden in 2010, is his second Met production; he also directed the new production of La Fille du Regiment that aired on Great Performances at the Met in 2008.

Manon features Pelly's costume designs, scenic design by Chantal Thomas, lighting design by Joel Adam, and choreography by Lionel Hoche in his Met debut. Pelly's production, set in the late 19th century, is a co-production of the Met, the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, Teatro alla Scala in Milan, and the Theatre du Capitole in Toulouse.

These were Netrebko's first complete Met performances as the hedonistic and irresistible Manon. In recent years, she has sung Manon to critical acclaim at the Vienna State Opera and in the premiere of Pelly's staging at the Royal Opera, Covent Garden.

Beczala sang his first-ever performances of the Chevalier des Grieux in this production. Since his 2006 Met debut as the Duke of Mantua in Rigoletto, he has sung Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor, Lenski in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin, Rodolfo in La Boheme, and Romeo in Romeo et Juliette.

Szot starred as Kovalyov in the 2010 Met premiere of Shostakovich's The Nose and returned in 2011 as Escamillo in Bizet's Carmen. He won a 2008 Tony Award for his portrayal of Emile de Becque in Rodgers and Hammerstein's South Pacific which aired on PBS' Live From Lincoln Center.

In the 2011-12 season, Luisi has led a diverse repertory of acclaimed performances at the Met, including the new production premieres of Don Giovanni (seen on Great Performances at the Met) and Wagner's Siegfried and Gotterdammerung, airing in September as part of the complete airing of Wagner's Ring Cycle on PBS.

Pelly, a noted French opera and theater director, made his Met debut in 2008 with the new production of Donizetti's La Fille du Regiment. He is the co-director of the Theater National de Toulouse Midi-Pyrenees and has directed theater productions at, among many others, the Comedie Francaise and Odeon in Paris and the Avignon Festival.

Manon was originally seen live in movie theaters on April 7 as part of the groundbreaking The Met: Live in HD series, which transmits live performances to more than 1700 movie theaters and performing arts centers in 54 countries around the world.

Great Performances at the Met is a presentation of THIRTEEN for WNET, one of America's most prolific and respected public media providers. For nearly 50 years, WNET has been producing and broadcasting national and local arts programming to the New York community.

Verena Dobnik, Associated Press, wrote of this production, "(Netrebko's)… supercharged voice is a fine fit for a production that paints a picture of ravishing Paris – with a knife in it," while Anthony Tommasini in The New York Times observed, "With her rich, gleaming sound and vocal charisma, [Netrebko] was a Manon of rare intensity and emotional depth… Mr. Beczala's ardent, virile voice sounded wonderful."

Soprano Deborah Voigt hosts the transmission. Gary Halvorson directs the telecast.

Great Performances is funded by the National Endowment for the Arts, the Irene Diamond Fund and the Philip and Janice Levin Foundation. Corporate support for Great Performances at the Met is provided by Toll Brothers, America's luxury home builder®. 

For the Met, Jay David Saks is Music Producer, Mia Bongiovanni and Elena Park are Supervising Producers, and Louisa Briccetti and Victoria Warivonchik are Producers. Peter Gelb is Executive Producer. For Great Performances, Bill O'Donnell is Series Producer; David Horn is Executive Producer.

Visit Great Performances online at www.pbs.org/gperf for additional information on this and other Great Performances programs.

About WNET

New York's WNET is America's flagship public media outlet, bringing quality arts, education and public affairs programming to over 5 million viewers each week. The parent company of public television stations THIRTEEN and WLIW21 and operator of NJTV, WNET produces and presents such acclaimed PBS series as Nature, Great Performances, American Masters, Need to Know, Charlie Rose and a range of documentaries, children's programs, and local news and cultural offerings available on air and online. Pioneers in educational programming, WNET has created such groundbreaking series as Get the Math, Oh Noah!  and Cyberchase and provides tools for educators that bring compelling content to life in the classroom and at home. WNET highlights the tri-state's unique culture and diverse communities through NYC-ARTS, Reel 13, NJ Today and the new online newsmagazine MetroFocus.

About the Met

Under the leadership of General Manager Peter Gelb and Music Director James Levine, the Met has a series of bold initiatives underway that are designed to broaden its audience and revitalize the company's repertory. The Met's 2012-13 season features seven new productions, including Donizetti's L'Elisir d'Amore, directed by Bartlett Sher and conducted by Maurizio Benini; the Met premiere of Thomas Ades's The Tempest, directed by Robert Lepage and conducted by the composer; Verdi's Un Ballo in Maschera, directed by David Alden and conducted by Met Principal Conductor Fabio Luisi; the Met premiere of Donizetti's Maria Stuarda, directed by David McVicar and conducted by Benini; Verdi's Rigoletto, directed by Michael Mayer in his Met debut and conducted by Michele Mariotti; Wagner's Parsifal, directed by Francois Girard in his Met debut and conducted by Daniele Gatti; and Handel's Giulio Cesare, also directed by David McVicar and conducted by Harry Bicket.

Building on its 81-year-old radio broadcast history—heard over the Toll Brothers-Metropolitan Opera International Radio Network—the Met uses advanced media distribution platforms and state-of-the-art technology to reach audiences around the world. The Met: Live in HD, the Emmy and Peabody Award-winning series of live performance transmissions to movie theaters around the world, returns for its sixth season in 2011-12. The series of 11 transmissions begins October 15 with Anna Bolena and ends with La Traviata on April 14. The Met recently introduced Met Player, a new subscription service that makes much of its extensive video and audio catalog of full-length performances available to the public for the first time online, and in exceptional, state-of-the-art quality. Metropolitan Opera Radio on SIRIUS XM broadcasts live performances from the Met stage three times a week during the opera season, as well; the Met on Rhapsody on-demand service offers audio recordings; and the Met presents free live audio streaming of performances on its website once every week during the opera season.

The Met has launched several audience development initiatives, including Open House dress rehearsals, a popular rush ticket program, Gallery Met, and an annual Holiday Series presentation for families. For more information, please visit: www.metopera.org.

SOURCE THIRTEEN/WNET