Superstar opera trio add sparkle to ‘The Hours’ at the Met

Actors (from left) Kelli O'Hara as Laura Brown, Renee Fleming as Clarissa Vaughan, and Joyce DiDonato as Virginia Woolf perform during a rehearsal for 'The Hours' at the Metropolitan Opera in New York. Photo: AFP

A powerhouse trio of American song will interpret the voice of Virginia Woolf on New York's prestigious Metropolitan Opera stage, as the highly anticipated run of The Hours makes its world premiere on Tuesday.

The Pulitzer Prize-winning novel and Oscar-nominated film explores how threads of English writer Woolf's "Mrs Dalloway" tie three women of different generations together, and its darkly moving operatic adaption offers a new vision of the drama that probes themes including mental illness and the alienation from tradition that haunts its protagonists.