Baltimore Opera Company

Study Guide

Rigoletto

The Story

ACT I. Strolling among the courtiers who throng the ballroom of his palace, the licentious Duke of Mantua boasts of his many amorous conquests ("Questo o quella"). His hunchbacked jester, Rigoletto, suggests that his master win the beautiful Countess Ceprano by imprisoning her husband. Count Ceprano, furious, vows in revenge to abduct a young girl who he believes to be Rigoletto's mistress. When Monterone, an elderly noble, forces his way in to denounce the Duke for seducing his daughter, he is mocked by Rigoletto ("Voi congiuraste contro noi, Signore"), sure of his master's protection. As Monterone is led away to prison by the guards, he curses the jester ("Si maledetto") who falls to the floor in horror.

Brooding over the curse ("Quel vecchio maledivami!"), Rigoletto hurries late at night to the house where he has hidden his beloved daughter Gilda. Before he reaches the gate, he is accosted by Sparafucile, a professional assassin, who offers his services for a fee. But Rigoletto dismisses him, reflecting bitterly that his tongue works as much harm as the assassin's dagger ("Pari siamo!"). The mood of the jester lightens when he is greeted by Gilda; lonesome in her seclusion, the girl embraces her father and begs him to tell her the story of her mother, who died long ago. Rigoletto sadly replies that his wife was an angel ("Deh non parlare al misero"), adding now that Gilda is all he has left to love in the world. Ever fearful for his daughter's safety, he summons her nurse, Giovanna, who he warns not to admit anyone to the garden. As the jester leaves, the Duke himself slips past him in the garden. Tossing a purse of coins to Giovanna as a bribe, he declares his love ("È il sol dell'anima") to the astonished Gilda, telling her that he is a poor student named Gualtier Maldé. When footsteps are heard in the street, Gilda pleads with him to flee. Alone, she dwells tenderly on his name ("Caro nome"). Meanwhile, the malicious courtiers, incited by Ceprano, stop Rigoletto in the dark street and ask his aid in abducting Ceprano's wife, who lives across the way. Relieved, the jester allows himself to be masked like the others, but the courtiers blindfold him instead. In his confusion, Rigoletto places their ladder against his own wall, while the courtiers laugh amongst themselves at their chance to outwit him; they break into his house and quickly carry off Gilda. At the sound of the girl's muffled cry for help, the duped jester tears the blindfold from his eyes to find himself alone. Seized with terror, he rushes into the garden, discovers Gilda's scarf, and after searching her room, reappears in anguish, remembering Monterone's curse ("Ah! La maledizione!")

ACT II. The Duke paces a room in his palace, fearing that his courtiers have robbed him of Gilda, who he imagines in lonely tears ("Parmi veder le lagrime"). When the courtiers return to tell him they have brought the girl to his chamber, he lustfully rushes to the conquest. Soon Rigoletto enters searching for Gilda, who, he confesses to the indifferent courtiers, is his daughter. Though astonished, they bar his way to the Duke's room, at which the jester lashes out at them for their cruelty and treachery ("Cortigiani! Vil razza dannata!") ending his raillery with a plea for mercy ("Miei signore … perdono, pietate …"). At that very moment Gilda appears, disheveled in her nightdress; she runs in shame to her father, who orders the courtiers to leave. When they are alone, the girl tells her father of the long courtship of the Duke, whom she had seen each week going to Mass ("Tutte le feste al tempio"). As Monterone is led through the corridors, the enraged Rigoletto swears to avenge his wrongs ("Sì, vendetta! Tremenda vendetta!"). Gilda, out of love, begs for the Duke's pardon.

ACT III. On a dark night, Rigoletto and Gilda lurk outside the decrepit inn, to which Sparafucile, aided by his voluptous sister Maddalena, lures his victims. The jester forces Gilda to watch the Duke, disguised as a soldier, seduce Maddalena, all the while laughing at the fickleness of women ("La donna è mobile"). While Maddelena leads her intended victim on, the jester comforts his daughter in the shadows outside (Quartet—"Bella figlia dell'amore"). Rigoletto tells Gilda to go home, dress herself as a boy and then meet him in Verona. He pays Sparafucile to murder the Duke and departs. As a storm brews, Maddalena urges her brother to spare the handsome stranger and kill Rigoletto instead. Shocked by her lack of professional ethics, Sparafucile refuses, but at length agrees to substitute the next guest who comes to the inn. Gilda, overhearing and glad to sacrifice herself for the Duke, knocks on the door at the height of the storm, is pulled into the inn and fatally stabbed. Before long, Rigoletto returns to collect the body of the Duke. The jester gloats over the sack the assassin gives him to dump into the river, but on hearing the supposedly dead Duke's voice in the distance, frantically cuts open the sack to find his daughter's crumpled body. Asking forgiveness, Gilda tells Rigoletto that she goes to join her mother in heaven ("Lassù in cielo, vicina alla madre"). When she dies, the distraught father cries that Monterone's curse has been fulfilled ("Ah! La maledizione!")

JAMES HARP

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