priests as he is taken away (Judgment scene, Amneris, Ramfis, and chorus: "Ahimè! .. morir mi sento .. Radamès, è deciso il tuo fato" / Alas .. I feel death .. Radamès, your fate is decided). Scene 2: The lower portion of the stage shows the vault in the Temple of Ptah; the upper portion represents the temple itself Radamès has been taken into the lower floor of the temple and sealed up in a dark vault, where he thinks that he is alone. As he hopes that Aida is in a safer place, he hears a sigh and then sees Aida. She has hidden herself in the vault in order to die with Radamès (Radamès: "La fatal pietra sovra me si chiuse" / The fatal stone now closes over me). They accept their terrible fate (Radamès: "Morir! Sì pura e bella" / To die! So pure and lovely!) and bid farewell to Earth and its sorrows (duet "Invan! Tutto e finito ... O terra addio"). Above the vault in the temple of Ptah, Amneris weeps and prays to the goddess Isis. In the vault below, Aida dies in Radamès' arms as the priests, offstage, pray to the god Ptah. (Chorus, Aida, Radamès, Amneris: "Immenso Ftha" / Almighty Ptah). Adaptations The opera has been adapted for motion pictures on several occasions, most notably in a 1953 production which starred Lois Maxwell as Amneris and Sophia Loren as Aida, and a 1987 Swedish production. In both cases, the lead actors lip-synched to recordings by actual opera singers. In the case of the 1953 film, Ebe Stignani sang as Amneris, while Renata Tebaldi sang as Aida. The opera's story, but not its music, was used as the basis for a 1998 musical of the same name written by Elton John and Tim Rice. The opera has been portrayed in the 2001 Italian animated film Aida of the Trees (Aida degli alberi). The characters are seen as anthropomorphic creatures between the fictional kingdoms of Alborea and Petra as the star-crossed lovers must find a way to unify their worlds together while facing off against the evil high priest Ramfis. Recordings References Sources (hardcover); (paperback). Paris: Slatkine (1983 reprint) . Further reading De Van, Gilles (trans. Gilda Roberts) (1998). Verdi's Theater: Creating Drama Through Music. Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press. (hardback), (paperback) Forment, Bruno (2015). "Staging Verdi in the Provinces: The Aida