This week we have selections from Franz Lehar’s final work, Giuditta, a story with shades of Carmen and Show Boat, but more importantly, a musical attempt by Franz Lehar to finally write an opera, to break out of the mold of being only a composer of operetta. Some critics think he succeeded, but most think he fell somewhere in between the two genres, and give its residence in that gray area as the reason why it does not have more performances in spite of its first rate music.
The beautiful Giuditta leaves her boring husband for the happy, life loving soldier Octavio. She follows him and his regiment to North Africa. At first they are happy, but when she urges him to desert because he is being transferred, he refuses. She becomes a night club singer, with many men pursuing her. Octavio does finally desert, and when he comes back he sees Giuditta leave her night club with Lord Barrymore, and it breaks Octavio's heart. in the last scene, four years later, he is reduced to playing piano in a hotel bar. Giuditta, now Barrymore’s mistress, sees him. She declares that she still loves him but it is too late; Octavio is too broken to respond.
