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A man to be feared, an extraordinary theatrical experience, an opera about loneliness and dread.

Joseph Fouché was not only Napoleon’s Minister of Police; he was also monk, tutor at a theological college, Jacobin, schemer and plotter, intellectual, mass murderer and inventor of the surveillance state. In 1820, he died in exile in Linz, where his status as a refugee had been accepted rather grudgingly by Metternich. In 2009, he came back to life in the opera seria FOUCHÉ, a dramatic profile of obsession with power in which the chief protagonists of Fouché’s past—Napoleon, Robespierre, Talleyrand and Joséphine Bonaparte—torment him with memories.

Franz Hummel, composer of 13 operas, is one of the most renowned and original European composers. Sandra Hummel is a lyrical poet and essayist; FOUCHÉ is her fifth libretto. Susan Oswell, the long-time leading light and choreographer (with Rosamund Gilmore) of the legendary London Laokoon Dance Group, has also made a name for herself as a composer of late. She was responsible for the choreography and mise-en-scène of Hummel’s work.
This commission was performed four times at the opening of the Capital of Culture year. It found great favor with audiences and garnered mostly rave reviews in the German-language media.


WHAT // Opera seria
WHEN // January 9-15, 2009
WHERE // Posthof Linz

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