Saturday, Jan. 18, the Mary D’Angelo Performing Arts Center hosted the Live in HD opera “Tosca” by Puccini.

The theater on campus in just one venue for the Metropolitan Opera’s Live in HD series. As the actual performance takes place in New York City, the viewer sitting in the PAC and other theaters across the country will be able to witness the opera taking place on a screen.

Most people purchased their tickets at the door with few buying them beforehand. Only 94 seats were taken out of 772 that the theater is capable of accommodating.

“Tosca” is one of several operas which are scheduled to show at Mercyhurst this year. Six more operas are scheduled to be performed by the end of the academic year including “Rusalka” by Dvořák, “Prince Igor” by Borodin, “Werther” by Massenet, “La Bohème” by Puccini and “Così Fan Tutte” by Mozart.

The Metropolitan Opera is a company based out of New York City and their Live in HD series allows people to view the operatic performance for a much cheaper and convenient option than viewing the original performance at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York.

“Tosca” is a tragic story of love and loss takes place in Rome in the year 1800 and was created in 1900 by Giacomo Puccini.

The opera features a woman whose husband was sent to execution for harboring a fugitive. The woman promises herself to a malicious police official in exchange for her husband’s life.

After the police officer commanded the husband be spared the woman stabbed him to death. The opera ends with the husband dying due to the insincerity of promise of the police officer to spare him and with the woman being hunted down for her murder of the police officer.