''The Postman Always Rings Twice'' is a 1982 opera with a libretto written by

Colin Graham Colin Graham OBE (22 September 1931 in Hove, England – 6 April 2007 in St. Louis, Missouri) was a stage director of opera, theatre, and television. Graham was educated at Northaw School (Hertfordshire), Stowe School and RADA. Early in his ...

and music by

Stephen Paulus Stephen Paulus (August 24, 1949 – October 19, 2014) was an American Grammy Award winning composer, best known for his operas and choral music. His style is essentially tonal, and melodic and romantic by nature. His best-known piece is his 1 ...

, based on the 1934 novel by James M. Cain, '' The Postman Always Rings Twice''. The opera was the first of four commissioned from Paulus by the Opera Theatre of St. Louis. It opened to generally strong reviews, and prompted the critic from the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'', in an otherwise mixed notice, to call Paulus "a young man on the road to big things".Henahan, Donal, "The Postman Always Rings Twice in St. Louis." ''New York Times'', 20 June 1982
(Accessed 15 December 2006). The opera has since been performed numerous times around the world, and Paulus composed eight more operas before his death in 2014.

Roles

Synopsis

The story is of a drifter, Frank, who stops at a

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are describ ...

diner for a meal and ends up working there. The diner is operated by a young, beautiful woman, Cora, and her much older husband, Nick. Frank and Cora have an affair. Cora and Frank scheme to murder Nick to start a new life together without her losing the diner. Their first attempt at the murder is a failure, but they eventually succeed.

References

External links

Bernard Holland, "A Novel Of Lust Becomes An Opera", ''New York Times'', 2 July 1998. Review of a 1998 New York production
{{DEFAULTSORT:Postman Always Rings Twice, The Operas English-language operas Operas set in the United States 1982 operas Adultery in theatre Operas by Stephen Paulus Operas based on novels