It is safe to say that November 12, at the Metropolitan Opera premiere of Leoš Janáček's "From the House of the Dead" (1930 posthumous premiere), after Fyodor Dostoevsky's early 1860s Siberian prison camp novel, marked the first time I had ever seen full male nudity on the Met stage, when a group of prisoners, played by actors, entered and dressed. But the effect was far from titillating, amid the horrific raving, brawling, avalanche of books and papers, smoke, and confessions of drunken crimes of passion that the opera encompasses. An intense tour-de-force for the orchestra, under Esa-Pekka Salonen, of London's Philharmonia Orchestra and Los Angeles Philharmonic fame, as well as for the strong ensemble of male soloists, directed by Patrice Chéreau, who famously staged Wagner's "Ring des Nibelungen" at Bayreuth from 1976 to 1980, with both Salonen and Chéreau making Met debuts, it is also probably the first time in a long time that a production team, completed by Thierry Thieû Niang, associate director, and designers Richard Peduzzi (sets), Caroline de Vivaise (contemporary costumes), and Bertrand Couderc (lighting)-all, save Peduzzi, making debuts-has been wholeheartedly cheered. Peduzzi's prison setting is as grim as the trappings he devised for the new "Tosca," which opened the Met season, but, here, the look is right.

There is a brief interlude of relative peace and humor, when the prisoners, some in drag, perform a pair of bawdy pantomimes, one about Don Juan, the other concerning a miller's lusty wife, for each other and the townspeople. Then it's back to the old grind. The only time a woman's voice is heard, shortly after the theatricals, it is that of a prostitute, portrayed by Kelly Cae Hogan. Soon, an irate prisoner (Vladimir Chmelo, debut) wounds another, young Alyeya (Eric Stoklossa, debut). Former rivals Shishkov (Peter Mattei) and Filka Morozov (Stefan Margita, debut), known as Luka Kuzmich, fail to recognize each other until it's too late to settle the old score. Alexander Petrovich Gorianchikov (Willard White), a political prisoner, is freed by the authorities and wrenched from Alyeya, with whom he had formed a tender father-son relationship, and an eagle, a symbol of hope, cared for by the inmates until its broken wing is mended, is freed as well, to an exultant cry of "czar eagle." There is little expectation that most of these prisoners ever will be.

Taking solo roles, beside those cited above, are Peter Straka (remembered from the 1991 Met premiere of "Kátˇa Kabanová"), Vladimir Ognovenko, Heinz Zednik (Mime in the Met's "Das Rheingold" and "Siegfried" in 1981), Kurt Streit, Jeffrey Wells, Adam Klein, Richard Bernstein, John Cheek (the Priest here, Petrovich in the March 1983 New York Philharmonic's United States concert premiere, under Rafael Kubelik), Scott Scully (debut), Ales Jenis (debut), Marian Pavlovic (debut), Peter Hoare (debut), and Andreas Conrad.

The concert premiere hearings, mentioned above, and American stage premiere performances, given by the New York City Opera in August and September 1990, were sung in English translation. Repetitions of "From the House of the Dead," given in Czech here, with English-language Met titles incorporated into the production, as well as on the seat backs, are on November 16, 21, 24, 28 and December 2 at 8 p.m. and December 5 at 1 p.m. For tickets, priced from $15 to 375, telephone 212/362-6000, visit www.metopera.org, or go the Met box office at Lincoln Center. Rush tickets, for $20, are available at the box office on the day of performance, from Monday through Thursday.