Arabella (R Strauss)

OK I saw the Fleming-Hampson Arabella and I have so many feelings about it.

First, we have the following items:
-One tenor (Matteo) who is going around... being... a tenor
-One overreacting baritone (Mandryka), confronted with misleading though convincing evidence of soprano betrayal
-One mezzo (Zdenka/Zdenko) who is cross-dressing and complicating everything
-One utterly blameless soprano (Arabella) who nevertheless is not very pleased by everyone else going crazy around her and eventually gives up on trying to explain, especially since she doesn't actually know at this point what's going on
-One bass (Waldner) who is having some family HONOR issues as a result of all of this
-Some swords and/or pistols that make a convenient appearance at this point in the plot (it's not actually clear to me whether it's both?)

Basically speaking, all the ingredients for a Verdian level of tragedy.

And then --

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