Mid-March, BMOP collaborates with Odyssey Opera on its fully staged production of Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Last Savage at Huntington Avenue Theatre. The three act opera buffa’s eclectic score and unexpected libretto delightfully subvert convention through Mozartian comic tropes.

Set in a satirical vision of mid‑20th‑century society, the opera follows Kitty, the spirited daughter of a wealthy American anthropologist, who insists on finding and taming a “savage” to prove her independence. She discovers Abdul, a young man living in the wilderness of India, and drags him back to the modern world as her prize specimen. Yet Abdul’s transformation into a polished socialite exposes the absurdities of both primitive stereotypes and the shallow sophistication of high society.

Menotti’s witty libretto skewers cultural pretensions, consumerism, and the clash between tradition and progress, while his score blends lyrical arias, jazzy rhythms, and pastiche of operatic conventions. The result is a playful yet biting comedy that asks whether civilization itself is the true masquerade.

This production highlights the opera’s enduring relevance, inviting audiences to laugh at its outrageous characters while reflecting on the timeless human desire to define—and defy—what is “savage” and what is “civilized.”