Bomarzo returned to Europe as part of the Bicentenary of the Teatro Real, in a new production by the Teatro Real and the Dutch National Opera whose Artistic Director, Pierre Audi, takes on the stage direction. The conductor is David Afkham, lead conductor of the Spanish National Orchestra and Choir, with a select cast and the Teatro Real Chorus and Orchestra.

First performed in 1967, Bomarzo is based on the novel of the same name by Manuel Mujica Lainez, inspired by the impressive 16th century sculptures of the Park of the Monsters, to the north of Rome.  The opera is a dizzying journey to the past. It takes place during the death throes of a hunchbacked duke, tormented by his physical deformity and obsessed with immortality, who recalls his corrupt, debauched life in the Italian aristocracy of the Cinquecento. The first and last time Bomarzo was staged in Europe was in 1976, in London, and since then it has not been performed for over 40 years.

In Bomarzo, in the province of Viterbo, 100 km north of Rome, there is a leafy park populated by colossal stone statues from the 16th century. Set among trees, streams and flowerbeds, are these fantastical mythical creatures, carved in an almost Expressionist style. These unsettling sculptures that seem to sprout from the rocks were commissioned by Duke Pier Francesco Orsini, who apparently expressed his grief at the death of his wife by engaging the Mannerist architects Pirro Ligorio and Jacopo Vignola to create this strange Sacro Bosco (sacred grove). Today it is known as Parco dei Mostri (Park of the Monsters) in reference to the sinister appearance it has acquired over time. The warped, mysterious sculptures, which fascinated Salvador Dalí, Jean Cocteau, André Breton, Michelangelo Antonioni and Luchino Visconti, also inspired Manuel Mujica Lainez to write his famous novel, Bomarzo.