The Metropolitan Opera’s
Innocence
Discussion and conversation with Esther Perel,
Kwame Anthony Appiah and Simon Stone.
Depicting the wide web of trauma left in the wake of a school shooting, the late, great Finnish composer Kaija Saariaho’s final opera, Innocence, presented at the Metropolitan Opera, is a raw and unflinching cri de coeur in response to the senseless violence of our modern age. Untangling the themes of concealment in the opera are psychotherapist and relationship expert Esther Perel, ethicist and writer Kwame Anthony Appiah, and the opera’s director, Simon Stone.
These three intellectuals, bridging psychology, philosophy and opera, discuss the consequences of withholding information from those we love. Join us for an interrogation of what provokes us to conceal, what encourages us to share and how our relationships are affected by the secrets we keep. Q&A with the audience to follow.
Innocence is on stage at the Metropolitan Opera from April 6 – 29. Click here for more information.
To celebrate the 20th anniversary release of Esther Perel’s bestselling book, Mating in Captivity, the first 300 attendees will receive a complimentary copy of the book. Please see a Met representative in the lobby upon arrival for details.
Professor Kwame Anthony Appiah received a Ph.D. from Cambridge in Philosophy and has taught at the University of Ghana, Legon, as well as at Yale, Cornell, Duke, Princeton and Harvard in addition to lecturing at many other institutions in the United States, Germany, Ghana, South Africa and at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris. Appiah has also published widely in literary and cultural studies, with a focus on African and African-American culture. He is also the author of three novels and serves as the writer for the popular New York Times column The Ethicist.
Actor and director Simon Stone made his Met Opera debut with Lucia di Lammermoor in 2022. Stone founded the theater group the Hayloft Project, for which he created adaptations of Chekhov’s Platonov, Seneca’s Thyestes, Wedekind’s Spring Awakening, and Ibsen’s Little Eyolf. In 2011, he became associate director at Sydney’s Belvoir St Theatre and served as resident director of Theater Basel. His opera productions include Tristan und Isolde and the world premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s Innocence. He wrote and directed the 2015 film The Daughter and the 2021 film The Dig.
Esther Perel photo: Katie McCurdy
Simon Stone photo: Maximilian Werner
In-Person Event
Wednesday, March 25
7:00 PM
Free, general admission
In partnership with
