Patricia Kern

Broadcast on 1 February 1956, composer Arthur Benjamin's Mañana was the first opera commissioned by the BBC. "The small Andalusian village comes to life in a sequence of short scenes introducing its inhabitants: a group of gossiping washerwomen, the prying eyes of the old rich widow looking down from her window, the neglected boy playing in the square, the pickpocket at work, the lazy man stretched out snoring in the midday sun, the Wise Man who mends china and writes letters for the poor and is fed in turn by the community. What will happen on the day when his food is given to a boy wrongly imprisoned in the local gaol and the Wise Man goes hungry? His anger is such that he prophesies the end of the world for mañana (tomorrow morning) and the credulous village repents and makes ready to meet its doom." —George R. Foa

Captain's daughter Josephine and common sailor Ralph Rackstraw are in love. However, their relationship is complicated by her arranged marriage to the high-ranking Sir Joseph Porter. A secret about the characters' true identities revealed by Little Buttercup, which leads to a farcical resolution. Filmed live from the 1980 Stratford Festival in Ontario.