|
Lyric Opera San Diego Home Resource Library Home The Merry Widow Home |
Victor León (1858 - 1940)
The Viennese-born Victor León became a stage manager for the Theater
in Josefstadt and the Carltheater and started to write libretti for Viennese
operettas. He first worked with Lehár when he wrote the book for his
The Tinker (Der Rastelbinder). With Leo Stein he was then
the librettist for The Merry Widow (Die lustige Witwe) and
several other works by Lehár. He also wrote the original version of The
Land of Smiles (Das Land des Lächelns) and was the librettist
for works of Kálmän,
Suppé and Oscar Straus. He also prepared the German version of Gilbert
and Sullivan's The Yeomen of the Guard.
Leo Stein (1861 - 1920-21)
Born Leo Rosenstein in what was Lemberg*, in Austria-Hungary, now Lviv in the
Ukraine in 1939, he changed his name to Stein, studied law and moved to Vienna.
There he took an office job while writing lyrics and collaborated with Victor
León on a number of works including The Merry Widow. Much admired
for his conscientious work and soundly constructed librettos, he also wrote
for Kálmán and others.
*Typical of the geography of the late nineteenth century and early twentieth, this city which had a large Jewish ghetto, became part of Poland in 1919, then of the USSR in 1945 and, finally, of the Ukraine in 1991.
Return to Merry Widow Home Page
Revised September 2006
Please credit Lyric Opera San Diego when using this material.