Toulouse. La bohème by Giacomo Puccini at the Capitole Theater –
Moments of nostalgia, hopes, dreams then disillusion of a youth on the fringes of society, are portrayed through encounters.
Passionate dialogues on art and philosophy, financial setbacks and amorous turmoil of four young companions pacing the Parisian pavement from Montmartre to the Latin Quarter: the poet Rodolfo, the painter Marcello, the musician Schaunard and the philosopher Colline, surrounded by Mimi, the little florist with a tender heart, and Musetta, the grisette. Cheerfulness and tenderness of the argument contrasting with the brutal awakening caused by the death of Mimi.
Realism and bel canto tinged with Wagnerian influence make up this lyrical transposition of a drama of artistic insouciance and happy precariousness, which Puccini owes to the adaptation by the librettists Illica and Giacosa, from the Milanese literary circles of the Scapigliatura , original homes of verismo, Scenes from Bohemian Life by Henry Murger.
Composed during the reign of Louis-Philippe, first published in the form of a serial, presented at the Théâtre des Variétés in 1849 before the Prince-President in person, the juxtaposed frescoes by Murger form in Puccini a plot barely connected by the tenuous thread of the love story that unites Rodolphe and Mimi.
In this eulogy of bohemian life, bourgeois and prostitutes, light women that
poverty leads to prostitution such as Musetta, shopkeepers and street vendors
complete the decor. Our four heroes led by their destiny from the attic to the Café
Momus and at the Barrière d’Enfer are perhaps the bourgeois-bohemians and intellectuals
today’s precarious situations, reminded, for a few seconds, of the harsh reality of life in the world.
New production from November 26 to December 6
More informations : https://www.theatreducapitole.fr/
Writing