About the life of a diva

Maria Callas was one of the greatest opera singers of the 20th century. Wolfgang Schukraft dedicates a one-person play with music to the diva and woman marked by fate, in which Lauren Francis plays and sings with captivating intensity. In Franz Garlik’s poignant production, as Maria Callas she reviews the most formative moments of her life, from her childhood to her personal “finale ultimo”.

Between myth and human being

Maria Callas is the diva assoluta, the “divine”, who revolutionized opera in the 20th century with her acting. She moved and fascinated people like hardly any other singer in the history of music. But what personality is hidden behind this dazzling opera diva? In Maria and the Callas, it becomes clear that deep chasms opened up between the myth of “Callas” and the person of “Maria”.

The musical theater premiered in Ulm in 2017. Author Wolfgang Schukraft recalls: “When I first met the soprano Lauren Francis, I already had the idea of seeing her in the role of Maria Callas in my theater. That motivated me to write this play for her. My involvement with Maria Callas confirmed to me that life writes the most exciting stories, and with Maria Callas you can add that it also writes the most dramatic stories.”

One-person play with Lauren Francis

Lauren Francis plays and sings with passion and the necessary reverence for this special woman. Precisely because it is a one-person play, it becomes clear how wildly the diva’s thoughts revolve around her successes and her suffering. Her emotions are supported by five great arias.

Lauren Francis began her career at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein and the Stadttheater Freiburg as the Queen of the Night. This was followed by engagements at the Staatstheater Darmstadt and Wiesbaden, as well as in her home country, at the Welsh National Opera and many more. Lauren Francis has enjoyed great success with the Rheinische Philharmonie, the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker, the Münchner Symphoniker, the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg and the Philharmonie der Nationen, among others. In 2013, she won the Jan Kiepura International Singing Competition.