Four hundred years ago, there lived an Emporer – Rudolf II – who dreamed of immortality. His alchemists therefore prepared an elixir of life for him. The Alchymist’s sixteen year old daughter is the first to taste the concoction, and consequently almost dies, but eventually recover and truly stopped aging. She wanders across Europe and after three hundred years returns to Prague to find the recipe for her father’s potion and got a new dose to extended her life by a further 300 years… This historical thriller written by Karel Čapek served Janáček as a model of one of the strangest operas which is now portrayed for the SND by great German director Peter Konwitschny. To Čapek, Janáček and the performers it is much more than merely a bizarre, pseudo- criminal plot. Like in the instance of Elina Makropulos, they undergo exploration of the old human dream of immortality. If our lives lost their natural boundaries, would we loose the sense in it? The mysterious girl knows the answer maybe.

Running time: 2 hrs 10 mins with one interval