La verbena de la Paloma (1982)

The action takes place in Venice, at the beginning of the 15th century. The curtain rises on a room with a large window overlooking the canal, in the house of Genaro, a young painter. It is the end of the day, and Maddalena, the painter’s beautiful wife, is waiting for him to come home. She stands at the open window, admiring the splendor of the blood-red sunset. The atmosphere is sultry – neither the air nor the water moves. There will surely be a storm. The song of approaching gondoliers is heard, and from the canal Gemma and Romeo, two friends of Maddalena’s, invite her to join them as they float “from the kingdom of dreams to paradise.” Maddalena declines the invitation, implying that she has already found her paradise- with Genaro, her husband. The friends float away, and Maddalena is left alone, waiting with growing impatience for her Genaro. At last he rushes in, and there is a passionate embrace. He tells her that he is obsessed by her beauty, that her image haunts him wherever he goes; his painting master set him to paint a Madonna, and quite involuntarily, he painted a Madonna with the face of Maddalena. The Master had been unhappy, his fellow students had mocked him, and he had rushed out through the crowded streets, oblivious of everything, wanting only to be with her.

By now it has become dark. There is an impassioned duet as the lovers sing of the joys to come, but their ecstatic climactic embrace is interrupted by a knock on the door. Genaro is understandably furious, but when he hears outside the voice of his old friend Stenio, his fury changes to astonished delight. Stenio is an alchemist, a recluse, who never visits anyone and hardly ever leaves his study. To be visited by him is a rare honor. Maddalena excuses herself, saying that she has heard he is diseased and frightening. She withdraws.

Stenio enters. He is ill at ease and in a state of deep depression. He complains about the gossip and old wives’ tales that have been spread about him, tales of witchcraft and devils! He has heard that Genaro is married, and that his wife is very beautiful. When Genaro offers to call her to meet him, he refuses. He has a secret to tell, for Genaro’s ears only. Genaro laughingly inquires whether he has at last discovered the philosopher’s stone that would enable him to trans- mute base metals into gold, but Stenio says that he has discovered something far more powerful than gold. For Genaro, there is only one thing more powerful than gold, and that is love- but he cannot imagine that the recluse Stenio would know anything about that!

Stenio reveals his secret. Some time before, a most beautiful woman had come to his house and offered herself to him as a lover, on condition that he asked no questions and made no attempt to discover her identity. For three months he lived in paradise and discovered love- something he had never known before. But after a while, gnawing jealousy raised its head, and he began to wonder where and with whom his beautiful lover was when she was not with him. She laughed at his doubts, and they began to quarrel. She tortured him and mocked him, and finally stopped going to see him altogether. Now, in his desperation, Stenio has come to Genaro for help and advice.

During Stenio’s confession the threatened storm has broken, and the room is sporadically lit by flashes of lightning. Stenio suddenly becomes aware that there is a third person in the room. He flings back a curtain, and a flash of lightning reveals Maddalena sitting there, listening intently. Stenio recognizes her as his lover, the sorceress who has bewitched him. Genaro is shocked and urges Stenio to calm himself- this is Maddalena, his wife! But when Maddalena makes no attempt to deny the charge, and when Stenio produces some pearls which, he says, his lover had left behind after the fire and fury of their embrace, Genaro, recognizing the pearls as his wedding gift to Maddalena, is forced to accept the truth. As the storm outside rages, the two men decide to kill Maddalena for her betrayal. They draw their daggers for the execution, but Maddalena succeeds in persuading Genaro that the code of honor demands that in such matters the lover, who has sullied the husband’s honor, must die first- and only then, the offending wife. She taunts Genaro into challenging Stenio, and in the ensuing fight, both men are mortally wounded. Stenio dies first, cursing Maddalena, and Genaro, after trying to kill her with his last remaining surge of strength, dies, urging her to kill herself and follow them to the judgment seat before God.

The storm dies down and Maddalena, contemplating the bodies of the two friends, wonders which of them she really loved- if, indeed, she had loved either! The passing of the storm and the dawning of a new, clear day symbolize for Maddalena the beginning of a new life and a new freedom. The night, her sister, will not betray her. She runs to the window and cries for help – a stranger has murdered her Genaro!

Edward Downes