Why ‘Dead Man Walking’ is the most performed new opera of the last 25 years

San Francisco Chronicle
September 2025

A quarter century after it burst onto the San Francisco stage with a story about capital punishment, justice and forgiveness, the opera “Dead Man Walking” is coming home. The landmark work by San Francisco composer Jake Heggie and librettist Terrence McNally returns to the War Memorial Opera House, Sept. 14-28, as part of the San Francisco Opera’s 103rd season.

Mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton, a longtime friend now slated to play Sister Helen in the Opera’s upcoming revival of the piece, believes Heggie’s music — lyrical and soaring — is what makes the opera so successful. 

“It shows you the story from all the different aspects — the actual crime, the parents of the kids who were killed, the people who work in the jail. At no point does it tell you, ‘You have to be on his side,’ or ‘You shouldn’t be on his side,’” Barton said. “I’m so glad it’s Jake Heggie who wrote this because he really knows how to flesh out a human story, and Sister Helen Prejean is as human as it gets in so many ways.”

Barton, who portrayed Sister Helen once before in Atlanta, first met the nun in real life in 2019 over a lunch of fried chicken. Barton admitted she felt intimidated prior to her first meeting with Sister Helen, but soon found her easy to talk to. “It’s like Jake says — I’ve never met Gandhi, and I’ve never met Sister Teresa, but I’ve met Sister Helen,” Barton said.

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