La Traviata at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts

La Traviata at the Marcus Center for the Performing Arts

The Florentine Opera opens its listener-friendly 80th season with Verdi’s much-loved tragedy about the doomed courtesan Violetta, played here by Elizabeth Caballero (Donna Elvira in the Florentine’s 2006 Don Giovanni). Get out your handkerchiefs. Nov. 8 & 10. Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. 929 N. Milwaukee St., 414-273-7206, marcuscenter.org

The Florentine Opera opens its listener-friendly 80th season with Verdi’s much-loved tragedy about the doomed courtesan Violetta, played here by Elizabeth Caballero (Donna Elvira in the Florentine’s 2006 Don Giovanni). Get out your handkerchiefs.

Nov. 8 & 10. Marcus Center for the Performing Arts. 929 N. Milwaukee St., 414-273-7206, marcuscenter.org

Paul Kosidowski is a freelance writer and critic who contributes regularly to Milwaukee Magazine, WUWM Milwaukee Public Radio and national arts magazines. He writes weekly reviews and previews for the Culture Club column. He was literary director of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater from 1999-2006. In 2007, he was a fellow with the NEA Theater and Musical Theater Criticism Institute at the University of Southern California. His writing has also appeared in American Theatre magazine, Backstage, The Boston Globe, Theatre Topics, and Isthmus (Madison, Wis.). He has taught theater history, arts criticism and magazine writing at Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.