L’Elisir d’Amore

By Gaetano Donizetti

Libretto by Felice Romani

Act I

While managing her family business, the wealthy and beautiful Adina gossips about love with her friend Gianetta and some other workers. At a distance, a local farm boy, Nemorino, listens to the banter and bewails his fate. He is passionately and fervently in love with Adina but has no material means to make such a marriage work. Nemorino hangs back in abject adoration and misery. Adina entertains the workers with the story of Tristan and Isolde. She laughs at the notion of a love potion that can enslave a woman to love. Adina is interested in the adorable Nemorino but, being a successful business woman first, she is annoyed by his inability to assert himself.

In swaggers the conceited and domineering Belcore with his attachés. Adina is clearly attracted to his bad-boy good looks and commanding presence. Belcore says he wants to marry her on the spot, and Adina impetuously agrees to give his proposal serious consideration. In the meantime, she offers the soldiers a round of refreshment and flirtation. Nemorino finds himself alone with Adina for a fleeting moment, and as he stares at his white bucks, he naively blurts out his love for her. Adina asserts that she is fickle as a breeze (Chiedi all’aura lusinghiera) and suggests that Nemorino go back to his uncle’s farm and stop pining for her.

Out on the street, the townspeople are gathering around a fantastic traveling salesman who arrives with a clamor. Dr. Dulcamara introduces himself grandly to the townspeople as a famous purveyor of patent medicine and other exotic articles, at fabulous prices (Unite, udite, o rustici). The citizens move in to buy up the sundries at his traveling Five and Dime. When the crowd scatters, Nemorino gingerly asks Dr. Dulcamara if he has a love potion like the one Adina described in the Tristan story. Always willing to please, Dr. Dulcamara pulls out a bottle of cheap wine and claims that this is the very elixir of love for the lucky guy with the cash to purchase it. Nemorino eagerly buys it with his last few dollars and gulps it down (Obligato, obligato!). Adina returns to find Nemorino high as a kite. Nemorino is crestfallen (Esulti pur la barbara per poco alle mie pene). In disgust, Adina heads toward Belcore and agrees to marry him before he heads off to boot camp the next day. Nemorino flies off believing that the elixir has forever ruined his chances for happiness with his beloved Adina.

ACT II

Adina and her friends are holding a party to celebrate her impending wedding. Dr. Dulcamara has gamely joined in and suggests that he and Adina sing a charming popular duet (Io son ricco, e tu sei bella). When the singing ends, Adina and Belcore go off to get their marriage license. Nemorino begs Dr. Dulcamara for another bottle of the elixir to win her back, but is refused when Dulcamara finds out he is broke. Belcore returns to town in a state of agitation because Adina has put him off till nightfall. He notices Nemorino’s misery and asks what the matter is. Nemorino confesses that he hasn’t got a penny and wishes to buy another bottle of elixir. Belcore agrees to spot him the cash if he agrees to join up with him and his buddies. Nemorino agrees and is given enough cash for his second bottle.

Gianetta runs in to the party to report the news that Nemorino’s uncle has died and willed him a fortune. Nemorino, who doesn’t yet know about his uncle or his fortune, joins the group in a state of drunken abandonment. He parties with the ladies, who now find him incredibly attractive (Dell elisir mirabile) and leaves with several. Adina sadly witnesses this spectacle as she walks by with Dr. Dulcamara, who reveals how he has deceived Nemorino and exploited his love for Adina (Quanto amore). When she also discovers Nemorino’s pact to join the army with Belcore she understands the depth of Nemorino’s innocent love for her. The crafty Adina realizes she must charm her way back to Nemorino, her true love, and sets out to pay off his debt to Belcore, whose impatience and impertinence have by this time turned her off.

Nemorino ambles through the backyards of the neighborhood in a contemplative state. Was that a tear he saw on Adina’s cheek as he departed with the other girls…(Una furtive lagrima)? As Adina finds him, he tries to feign indifference, but when she confesses that she has paid back Belcore out of love, happiness bubbles over on all sides. Belcore soon discovers that Nemorino and Adina are now engaged, and he cuts his losses philosophically, bragging that many other women await his attentions. Dr. Dulcamara is quick to capitalize on the power of his elixir to grant both love and money. He remarkets his supply of the cheap wine and quickly heads out of town, while Adina and Nemorino celebrate their love – and the growth of agricultural enterprise.

Synopsis courtesy of Ruth Zaleski

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