FULL BATHORY ERZSEBET (Szomor) Budapest 2023 Katalin Benedekffy, János Szemenyei, János Szilágyi

Information on the Performance

• Work Title: Báthory Erzsébet   
• Composer: Szomor Gyorgy   
• Libretto: Tibor Miklos    Libretto Text, Libretto Index
• Venue & Opera Company: Margaret Island Outdoor Stage, Budapest, Hungary  
• Recorded: June 10, 2023
• Type: Staged Opera Live
• Singers: Katalin Benedekffy, János Szemenyei, János Szilágyi, Róbert V. Laczkó, Loránd Farkas, Orsolya Veress, László Mányoki
• Conductor: Szabolcs Kulcsár  
• Orchestra:
• Choreographer: Péter Novák  
• Stage Director: Antonia Goszleth  
• Stage Designer: Rita Vereckei  
• Costume Designer: Bori Kiss,   

Information about the Recording

• Published by: M5  
• Date Published: 2025  
• Format: Streaming
• Quality Video: 4 Audio:4
• Subtitles: nosubs  

• ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON THIS PERFORMANCE

  Musical – opera in two acts

  The staging of the musical opera Elizabeth of Báthory, a co-production with the Budapest Szabad Tér Theatre, was a unique undertaking in the history of the Hungarian Opera of Cluj. The performance was created with the participation of more than a hundred artists, spectacular scenery, costumes and choreography, presenting the Cluj company with new challenges both artistically and technically.

  The work focuses on one of the most controversial women in Hungarian history, whose fate has inspired numerous literary, musical, visual and cinematic works. Erzsébet Báthory was born in 1560, married Count Ferenc Nádasdy at the age of fifteen, and was widowed before she was thirty. Although she was considered one of the most beautiful and richest women in Europe at the time, she lived a secluded life after her husband’s death, rejecting numerous suitors.

  However, her fortune was not only sought through marriage: her cousin, Count Thurzó, initiated an investigation against her based on fabricated charges in order to obtain the Nádasdy inheritance that had passed to Elisabeth Báthory after her husband’s death. During the investigation, Elisabeth was accused of various atrocities, including bathing in the blood of unmarried women, torturing her servants with particular cruelty, practicing witchcraft, and even being a vampire. The accusations were not proven, but the countess was nevertheless held captive in a walled-up room until her death, and her image remained in the public consciousness as a blood countess, a witch, and a serial killer. This is despite the fact that posterity has found evidence that the allegedly tortured servants were well-to-do, and the allegedly murdered virgins were poor women who were cared for and educated by Elizabeth Báthory.

  Teodóra Bán, director of the Budapest Summer Festival, has been preoccupied with the historical legend of Elizabeth Báthory for years. “I was interested in what kind of horror stories are born when society, the micro- or macro-environment misinforms the community. We, women, are often victims of this even today. I don’t deny that, in a different sense, I have been a victim of this myself,” said Teodóra Bán. The musical-opera was born from her idea and at her request, with the collaboration of composer György Szomor, lyricist Tibor Miklós and arranger Péter Pejtsik.

  The basic plot of the musical-opera is revealed in the investigation initiated by Thurzó, in her recollections of the countess’s life. “We are recreating the misunderstood and misinterpreted figure of Elizabeth Báthory in the spirit of postmodernism, I emphasize a stage figure… The story is about a power game. It is very similar to our lives, to how politics can enforce its power and interests… She betrays, cheats, kills, lies, accuses people,” said director Bertalan Bagó.

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