WHEN:
October 11–26, 2025
WHERE:
Lyric Opera of Chicago
20 N. Wacker Drive
Suite 860
Chicago, IL 60606
A spokesperson describes the event as follows:
“...CHICAGO (8/21/2025) — Lyric Opera of Chicago’s 2025/26 Season kicks off with a searing tale of vengeance and betrayal: Cherubini’s Medea, on stage October 11–26, 2025. Euripides's ancient tragedy comes to blazing life in this riveting opera, a late 18th-century masterpiece with music and themes that continue to resonate across the millennia. Medea marks the return of three Chicago-born international stars to the Lyric stage: superstar soprano Sondra Radvanovsky in an Olympic-level performance of the title role; acclaimed tenor Matthew Polenzani; and the rising star mezzo-soprano Zoie Reams. With the Lyric Opera Orchestra conducted by Lyric Music Director Enrique Mazzola, Cherubini’s score delivers operatic fire and fury as never before. Lyric presents Medea for the first time in its seven-decade history in a production directed by Sir David McVicar, who returns with a sweeping vision of beauty and decay that commands attention from first note to final breath.
Hell hath no fury like a sorceress scorned. This centuries-old tale burns with unrelenting emotional fire, and in Cherubini’s hands, it demands to be retold. Audiences witness the tragedy of Medea, a powerful sorceress betrayed by her lover, Giasone, who abandons her and their two children to marry another woman, Glauce, the daughter of the king Creonte. Given just 24 hours to accept her fate, Medea instead bends it to her will, with her accomplice, Neris, at her side, delivering vengeance that shakes the very foundations of the kingdom. A favorite of Beethoven himself, who considered Cherubini to be the greatest living composer of his time, Medeachannels the raw power of Greek tragedy and sets it to unforgettable music, leaving audiences breathless as love curdles into rage, and a mother’s heartbreak becomes her most devastating weapon..."
