Gli equivoci (1786)

This dramma buffo in due atti is linked to Plautus via Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors. The librettist Lorenzo da Ponte worked with a French translation of the Shakespearean play, Les méprises by M. Letourneur (1782). According to the New Grove Opera, da Ponte 'changed or italianized many of Shakespeare’s names and omitted the Abbess and the Courtesan, but gave the shipwrecked Dromio a wife. As in the play there are two pairs of identical twins: two servants, both called Dromio, and two masters, here both called Eufemio (in Shakespeare, Antipholus)'. Further productions of the opera in Storace's lifetime: Prague 1793 (Sartori ID 8975); Leipzig 1793; Dresden 1797 (Sartori ID 8976). Modern productions include: in the English translation by Arthur Jacobs, 20 February 1974, Camden Festival, London.