Great Performances at the Met: Dead Man Walking

Experience Tony Award-winning director Ivo van Hove’s production of composer Jake Heggie’s opera based on a true story. With a libretto by Tony Award winner Terrence McNally, famed soprano Joyce DiDonato stars as Sister Helen alongside bass-baritone Ryan McKinny as the death row inmate Joseph De Rocher. The cast also features Latonia Moore as Sister Rose, and mezzo-soprano Susan Graham, who sang Helen Prejean in the opera’s 2000 premiere, plays De Rocher’s mother. Based on Sister Helen’s real-life memoir about the fight for the soul of a condemned murderer, Met Music Director Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts this Metropolitan Opera premiere. Grammy winner Rhiannon Giddens hosts the broadcast.

Great Performances at the Met: Dead Man Walking is the first primetime opera to appear in season 18 of Great Performances at the Met. It is followed by the new, modern-day production of Carmen starring Aigul Akhmetshina premiering Friday, June 14 at 9 p.m. on PBS (check local listings). The full season 18 schedule of Great Performances at the Met includes operas premiering now through October.

 

Cast:

Joyce DiDonato – Sister Helen Prejean

Ryan McKinny – Joseph De Rocher

Helena Brown – Mother

Latonia Moore – Sister Rose

Susan Graham – Mrs. Patrick De Rocher

Briana Hunter – Sister Lillianne

Magdalena Kuźma – Sister Catherine

Matteo Omoso Castro – Jimmy

Alexa Jarvis – Mrs. Charlton

Justin Austin – Motorcycle Cop

Chad Shelton – Father Grenville

Raymond Aceto – Warden George Benton

Christopher Job & John Hancock – Prison Guards

Patrick Miller, Jonathan Scott, Earle Patriarco, Ross Benoliel, Tyler Simpson – Inmates

Regan Sims – Paralegal

Mark Joseph Mitrano – Older brother

Rod Gilfry – Owen Hart

Krysty Swann – Jade Boucher

Wendy Bryn Harmer – Kitty Hart

Chauncey Packer – Howard Boucher

Jonah Mussolino – Younger Brother

 

Creative:

Yannick Nézet-Séguin – Conductor

Rhiannon Giddens – Host

Gary Havorson – Director

Jake Heggie – Music

Terence McNally – Libretto

Ivo Van Hove – Production

Jan Versweyveld – Set and lighting designer

An D’Huys – Costume designer

Christopher Ash – Projection designer

Tom Gibbons – Sound designer

Sister Helen Prejean – Book upon which show is based