PORTLAND – PCA Great Performances will bring the Teatro Lirico d’Europa production of Giacomo Puccini’s opera “Tosca” to Merrill Auditorium Thursday, Nov. 1. The three-act performance will be sung in its original Italian with English supertitles.

The opera brings three characters to life: Tosca, a famous opera singer, deeply religious and spiritual, but also passionate and fatally jealous; Mario Cavaradossi, Tosca’s lover who is an idealist and courageously tries to help a condemned political prisoner; and Baron Scarpia, a power-maddened monster who is the chief of the Roman police and determined to possess Tosca.

Replete with assassination, murder and suicide, Puccini’s creation is opera at its most dramatic.

The opera will begin at 7:30 pm. Tickets are $53, $46, and $38; student tickets are $15. Tickets are available through PortTix, the box office at Merrill Auditorium; by calling 842-0800; and at www.pcagreatperformances.org.

A free PCA Offstage precurtain lecture at 6 p.m. with Dr. Deirdre McClure, a conductor and music director, will provide insight into the character of Tosca, one of opera’s most tragic heroines.