The Marriage of Figaro
The Marriage of Figaro (, ), K. 492, is an opera buffa (comic opera) in four acts composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an Italian libretto written by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 1 May 1786. The opera's libretto is based on a stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais, "La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro" ("The Mad Day, or The Marriage of Figaro"), which was first performed in 1784. It tells how the servants Figaro and Susanna succeed in getting married, foiling the efforts of their philandering employer Count Almaviva to seduce Susanna and teaching him a lesson in fidelity.
Ferdinando Fontana
During his time in Milan, Fontana wrote two plays in Milanese dialect, "La Pina Madamin" and "La Statôa del sciôr Incioda". Both had considerable success and starred Edoardo Ferravilla, considered one of the greatest comic actors in Milanese theatre. He wrote numerous libretti, including two for Alberto Franchetti ("Asrael" and "Zoroastro") and two for Puccini ("Le Villi" and "Edgar"). He also translated several operetta libretti for performance in Italy, including Franz Lehár's "Die lustige Witwe (The Merry Widow)" and "Der Graf von Luxemburg (The Count of Luxembourg)", Oskar Nedbal's "Polenblut (Polish Blood)", and Edmund Eysler's "Der Frauenfresser (The Woman-Eater)". Early in his career, Fontana's output was prodigious: an 1886 article in "La Stampa" said that at the time, 13 new libretti by Fontana were being composed by 12 different composers.