Start your opera season with a double feature

If you're a hard-core opera buff, Saturday will be your kind of day. The Metropolitan Opera will kick off this season's movie-theater showings in the afternoon with "The Elixir of Love," and Opera Carolina will open its season in the evening with "Tosca." 

A romantic comedy and a thriller, both of them Italian tunefests: not a bad double feature, actually. If that's a little much for you, though, no problem. Just spread them out. "Tosca" will have repeat performances Oct. 18 and 21, and the Met will encore "Elixir" on Nov. 7. 

Opera Carolina's season will continue after the holidays with Mozart's "The Magic Flute" -- featuring sets, costumes and video projections by Jun Kaneko, designer of last season's "Madama Butterfly" -- and Bizet's "The Pearl Fishers." "Elixir" kicks off a series of 12 Met showings, some of them featuring works that hardly ever turn up outside opera festivals or the biggest opera houses -- such as Berlioz's epic "The Trojans."

As usual, the Met showings will be at Stonecrest near Ballantyne and at Concord Mills. Here's the list: 

Saturday: Donizetti's "The Elixir of Love." (Photo of Anna Netrebko and Matthew Polenzani by Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera) 

Oct. 27: Verdi's "Otello," with Renee Fleming as the doomed Desdemona. 

Nov. 10: Thomas Ades' "The Tempest." 

Dec. 1: Mozart's "La Clemenza di Tito." 

Dec. 8: Verdi's "A Masked Ball." 

Dec. 15: Verdi's "Aida." 

Jan. 5: Berlioz's "The Trojans." 

Jan. 19: Donizetti's "Maria Stuarda." 

Feb. 16: Verdi's "Rigoletto." 

March 2: Wagner's "Parsifal." 

March 16: Zandonai's "Francesca da Rimini." 

April 27: Handel's "Julius Caesar."