In a crowded field of silly operas, L’Elisir d’Amore is as daft as they come – it’s all unrequited love, love potions, trickery …. and a happy ending. But the great joy of this piece is Donizetti's bubbling score. And director Laurent Pelly’s desirable Italy is a rerun of 1950s La Dolce Vita, complete with Vespas, Chantal Thomas’s fizzing design complementing Pelly’s costumes.

The revival of this much-loved production from 2012 comes with superstar casting. As the love-struck Nemorino, the Mexican tenor Rolando Villazón, whose previous Covent Garden roles include Rodolfo in Puccini's La Bohème, Lensky in Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin and Don Ottavio in Mozart's Don Giovanni, sings five performances (27, 29 May and 3, 6, 11 June). Another great ROH Rodolfo and house favourite, the French tenor Roberto Alagna, sings the remaining performances (13, 16, 19, 22 June).

Nemorino’s adored Adina is sung by the South African soprano Pretty Yende, making her Royal Opera debut, and by the Polish soprano Aleksandra Kurzak , who was in the original production, and whose other Covent Garden roles include Gilda in Rigoletto and the title role in Lucia di Lammermoor.

Both Kurzak and Alagna are to return to Covent Garden for Puccini’s Turandot in July 2017.

Gaetano Donizetti (1797-1858) was so prolific – he wrote more than 70 operas – that he was once caricatured as writing a serious opera with one hand while composing a comedy like L’Elisir with the other. L’Elisir was premiered in 1832 and has been a hit ever since. A subplot about buying out of the army mirrors the composer’s own life: a wealthy woman paid for Donizetti to duck out of the Austrian army.

L’Elisir d’Amore is sung in Italian with English surtitles.

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Booking for the general public opens at 9am on 24 Jan. Click here for more details and for links to priority booking schemes.