This spring, a “diabolically astute pairing” (Toronto Star) returns to the COC mainstage led by award-winning and visionary Canadian stage director Robert Lepage. In Bluebeard’s Castle by Béla Bartók, a new wife discovers that seven locked doors in her husband’s home conceal stunning, and gruesome, secrets. Then, in Erwartung by Arnold Schoenberg, a woman’s search for her missing lover explodes into a blistering descent into madness. Together, the one-act masterpieces fuse into an unrelenting psychological journey—a thrilling experience that plunges audiences into the darkest corners of desire, dread and the human psyche. Bluebeard’s Castle / Erwartung runs for seven performances at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts on April 25, 29; May 8, 10, 12, 14, and 16, 2026.

François Racine directs the spring revival of Robert Lepage’s iconic production, using innovative set and lighting design to seamlessly connect two unique stories into one cohesive work.

Drawing inspiration from Austrian painter Gustav Klimt’s richly gilded canvases, acclaimed set and costume designer Michael Levine sets the action of both operas within a stunning gold-tiled frame that contrasts with the stark walls and darkness of Bluebeard’s castle.

Atmospheric lighting from Robert Thomson evokes blood-red torture chambers, gleaming treasures, and eerie lakes of tears, while inventive media effects from Laurie-Shawn Borzovoy enhance the surreal experience

Bartók’s one-act Symbolist opera unfolds as a taut psychological drama, where love and terror intertwine while each newly opened door dives deeper into a realm of mounting orchestral splendour and existential unease. Christian Van Horn, “a bass-baritone of uncommon agility and power” (The New York Times) and Metropolitan Opera regular, stars as the brooding, enigmatic Duke Bluebeard, opposite mezzo-soprano Karen Cargill returning to the COC as Bluebeard’s wife Judith, a role for which The Boston Globe recently praised her “dramatically savvy and vocally powerful” portrayal. The highly atmospheric, post-romantic score merges psychological intensity with Hungarian folk-influenced speech rhythms.

Paired with Bartók’s brooding fairy tale, Erwartung, the searing monodrama by Arnold Schoenberg, offers a striking study in psychological suspense, its modernist intensity amplified by Lepage’s commanding staging. A tour de force for a single performer, the opera stars soprano Anna Gabler in her COC debut, commanding the all-encompassing role of a woman wandering through a shadowed forest in search of her lover. The opera dispenses with traditional melody in favour of atonality and extreme emotional shifts, creating a feverish, stream-of-consciousness soundscape that mirrors the heroine’s fractured psyche.

COC Music Director Johannes Debus leads the COC Orchestra through both Bartók’s demanding and powerfully evocative orchestration and Schoenberg’s groundbreaking score.

Bluebeard’s Castle is sung in Hungarian with English and French SURTITLES™

Erwartung is sung in German with English and French SURTITLES™

Ticket Information:

Regularly priced tickets for Bluebeard’s Castle / Erwartung start at $45 for adults, with $28 and $35 tickets available for guests between the ages of 16 and 29 through the COC’s Opera Under 30 program. Tickets can be purchased online at www.coc.ca or by calling the Four Seasons Centre Box Office at 416-363-8231.

For more information on booking student groups, standing room, and rush tickets, please visit www.coc.ca.

Photo: John Relyea as Bluebeard and Ekaterina Gubanova in Bluebeard’s Castle. © 2015 Michael Cooper.