Known for her iconic fashion, extravagant spending and fate at the guillotine during the French Revolution, Marie Antoinette’s pivotal role in the transformation of opera during the 18th century is rarely discussed. Her enmeshment with music, however, saw her through many highs and lows. Antonia takes us on a journey from Marie Antoinette's initial popularity (charming the public by applauding and being serenaded at the première of Gluck's Iphigénie en Aulide at the Paris Opera), through to the last days of her residency at Versailles with musicians fleeing her court, and her eventual arrest and execution.   

A fierce champion of Gluck, whose dramatic, simple style became a precursor to the music of Richard Wagner, the queen also supported a number of other composers who set the tone for the Italian bel canto tradition, and her closeness to certain composers within the strict setting of Versailles would prove central to her downfall.

Olivia Doutney as Marie Antoinette addresses the audience directly in a performance 'brimming with heart and humour' (Cathryn Bell), with Petra Hajduchová at the harpsichord weaving in and out of character as the composers, creating a salon-style atmosphere, as though the audience has dropped into the royal living room. This is Marie Antoinette as you’ve never seen or heard her before! 

Inspired by Sarah Grant's Marie Antoinette Style exhibition at the V&A and the intimate appeal of the one-woman theatrical form, Olivia creates a new interpretation of Marie Antoinette's character. Drawing on her studies of 18th-century France and the French Revolution at UCL, alongside extensive research into the history of 18th- and 19th-century opera at the Haute École de Musique de Genève and Hochschule der Künste Bern, she brings the queen's inner world and passion for music to life through a 'mini opera'.