Dead Man Walking

Based on Sister Helen Prejean’s bestselling memoir exploring the morality and personal impact of the death penalty, American composer Jake Heggie and librettist Terrence McNally’s modern masterpiece was hailed at its San Francisco premiere as “the most compelling new American opera in decades” by The Wall Street Journal. This season, director Ivo van Hove gives Heggie’s masterpiece its Met premiere, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin and starring mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato as Sister Helen. The cast also features baritone Etienne Dupuis as the condemned inmate Joseph De Rocher, soprano Latonia Moore as Sister Rose, and mezzo- soprano Susan Graham, who sang Prejean at the 2000 world premiere, as De Rocher’s mother.