NEW YORK -- Call it bel canto in the Rust Belt.The Metropolitan Opera’s new production of “Lucia di Lammermoor” plucks the ill-fated heroine out of the Scottish hills where Sir Walter Scott placed her in his 1819 novel and where Italian composer Gaetano Donizetti kept her in his opera 16 years later.Instead, director Simon Stone has transplanted her to a contemporary American town whose once-prosperous residents are suffering the effects of economic decline and where the pharmacy and pawnshop are among the only thriving businesses.“It can feel relaxing to escape and go to a Donizetti opera that’s set in a previous era,” Stone said in a panel discussion at the opera house during rehearsal. “But I think it’s less of a transformative experience than if you can go, “Wow, this is about me, my family, us.'”Stone said he looked for an American equivalent to the original setting and settled on the Rust Belt.“The novel and opera are about the end of the aristocracy in Scotland, and it became an incredibly poor country very quickly,” he said in an interview.
Warning over new laws on fuel, road tax and plastic in major changes today
01.04.2022 - 13:01 / dailyrecord.co.uk
Scottish households have a list of new laws to know after the energy price cap came into effect today.
Several energy websites crashed yesterday as customers rushed to submit meter readings before the massive price cap increase became official.
But that's not the only major change happening today - road tax increased, minimum wage and living wage rates were updated, and a new plastic packaging tax was introduced, the Mirror reports.
As for more motoring news, drivers should be aware that the 5p cut in fuel duty announced in the Spring Statement will last until March 2023.
Here's what you need to know about all the legal changes on April 1 and some others to come.
Vehicle excise duty (VED) or road tax, vehicle tax or road fund licence, is set to increase from today (April 1).
Road tax is calculated by using the age of the car and carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from it.
The standard rate for cars registered after 2017 emitting between 1 and 50kg of CO2 will go up from £155 to £165.
Cars that don't emit CO2 will not need to pay road tax.
The new plastic packaging tax is an environmental tax designed to encourage businesses to use recycled plastic while manufacturing their packaging, by providing a financial incentive to businesses.
The tax means that starting from April 1, manufacturers and importers will have to pay a tax of £200 per tonne on packaging that is made of less than 30% of recycled plastic.
The rate of corporation tax will be kept at 19% by the Finance Act 2021 for the 2022 financial year. However, this is set to increase to 25% from April 1 2023 onwards, applying to profits over £250,000.
Any companies that earn profits of £50,000 or less will continue to pay 19% as a small profits rate (SPR) from 2023-24.
Meanwhi
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