Petruzzelli Theatre

History

The history of the Teatro Petruzzelli of Bari begins when Onofrio and Antonio Petruzzelli, traders and ship builders from Bari, presented the designs for the theatre drawn up by their brother-in-law, the engineer Angelo Bari Cicciomessere (then Messeni) to the city of Bari. The proposal for building the Petruzzelli was accepted and, on 29 January 1896, a contract was signed between the family and the city administration. Two years later, in October 1898, work began and it ended in 1903.

The interior of the theatre was painted by Raffaele Armenise. On completion the Teatro Petruzzelli overtook the Teatro Comunale of Corato as the largest theatre of Apulia. The theatre was inaugurated on Saturday, 14 February 1903 with Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots.

In the 1980s, the theatre hosted two major operatic debuts, that of Iphigénie en Tauride by Niccolò Piccinni which had never been presented after its debut in Paris in 1779, and the Neapolitan version of Bellini's I Puritani, which was written for Maria Malibran but was never performed by her. Both events contributed to making the city world-famous.

In addition to operas, ballets and big concerts were presented. Many great international artists have performed at the Petruzzelli: these include Tito Schipa, Herbert von Karajan, Rudolf Nureyev, Frank Sinatra, Ray Charles, Liza Minnelli, Juliette Gréco. Great Italian artists include Eduardo De Filippo, Riccardo Muti, Carla Fracci, Luciano Pavarotti, Piero Cappuccilli and Giorgio Gaber.

The Petruzzelli also hosted important concerts of light music (among others concerts by Paolo Conte and Ornella Vanoni) and it was the headquarters of Azzurro, a musical programme, for almost all of the 1980s. The interior was also used as a location for films such as Il giovane Toscanini by Franco Zeffirelli and Polvere di stelle by Alberto Sordi.

During the night of 26 and 27 October 1991 the theatre was completely destroyed by fire, the result of arson. The last opera presented was Norma.

The criminal trial of those accused of setting the fire ended with the acquittal of the defendants and the condemnation of the perpetrators of the incident. …