About the work
Melodramma giocoso in two acts by Gaetano Donizetti to a libretto by Domenico Gilardoni, based on the French comedy "Le bourgmestre de Saardam ou Les deux Pierre" (1818) by Mélesville, Merle and Boirie. It premiered on 19 August 1827 at the Teatro del Fondo in Naples.
Plot
Tsar Peter the Great works incognito as the carpenter Pietro Mikailoff at a Dutch shipyard in Saardam. When the mayor learns that a Russian ruler is present in the town, confusion between two men both named "Pietro" drives the comedy. Before leaving, the Tsar arranges for his friend Pietro Flimann to marry the mayor's daughter.
Cultural significance
The opera gradually became popular in Naples but flopped after a single performance at its 1828 Milan premiere at La Scala — Vincenzo Bellini had predicted the failure. The same French source later inspired Albert Lortzing's "Zar und Zimmermann" (1837); Donizetti's version then fell into obscurity and was rediscovered only in 1973 in Zaandam, in the Netherlands.