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La Bohème enchants musically
disappoints in setting
The perfect opera to serve as an introduction for a novic

By Alidë Kohlhaas

To introduce novices to opera, there is no better piece than La Bohème to give them a taste of this wonderful art form. Last Saturday Opera Ontario’s La Bohème succeeded to convince a visitor from the West Coast that opera need not be a frightening experience. And so, in the comfortable surroundings of Hamilton Place a new convert to opera was born, much to this writer’s delight.

Giacomo Puccini’s operas are a mixture of romance and tragedy with lilting, lyrical music that cannot but enchant anyone exposed to it. Just think Madama Butterfly, another opera that is perfectly suited as an introduction to opera’s mixture of music, story and visual experience; if not Puccini than perhaps the Frenchman Maurice Ravel’s passionate and tragic Carmen is another well suited instrument for introduction to the realm of opera.

La Bohème, among the opera canon stands out for having main characters who are well-defined, musically and emotionally. Its music has an astonishing melodic richness that can capture ones emotions with ease. Its story is simple and easy to follow. It is an opera that needs a youthful cast. Opera Ontario chose a most appealing one, visually and musically, thus confirming the intrinsic nature of the work. The voices in this production, in every instance, had the strength to reach out in full clarity to the audience.

The four principals, Sally Dibblee as the guileless seamstress Mimi, Marc Hervieux as the impulsive poet Rudolfo, Mirela Tafaj as the coquettish courtesan Musetta, and Gregory Dahl as the long-suffering painter Marcello were in complete control of their characters. This is all the more sign of Opera Ontario’s maturing into an opera company worth noting because for the four this was their debut in these roles. One can also not fault the supporting characters, Dion Mazerolle as the musician Schaunard, Alexander Savtchenko as the philosopher Colline, and the well-known bass, Joseph Rouleau, who came out of retirement for this event to sing the double role of landlord Benoit, and the amorous Alcindoro, a councillor of state.

The orchestra, led by conductor Daniel Lipton, performed beautifully and never overshadowed the singers. The only time it did, the blame rests on the stage direction rather than the orchestra. In the final scene, when Mimi dies, Rudolfo sings those well-known final notes, calling out her name in despair. It is a sound that should sink right into ones bones. Sadly, it is sung with Hervieux’s face turned down towards the expired Mimi and the anguished call never quite reach the audience. One hopes that in the remaining performances, this will be corrected.

For those who do not know the story of La Bohème – which is filled with the timeless themes of love, jealousy, and death – here is a very brief outline. Marcello, Rudolfo, Schaumard and Colline are penniless artists living in a garret in the Latin Quarter of Paris. It is Christimas Eve and they have little to eat and no money to buy fuel to heat their abode. Musetta is Marcello’s ex-lover, who has deserted him for the more comfortable life with an elderly admirer, Alcindoro. Mimi, a consumptive, meets Rudolfo that evening when her candle is blown out and she knocks on his door for help while he is alone – his friends have gone off to a café, where he is to meet them later. Needless to say, Rudolfo and Mimi at once fall in love, and the rest of the story unfolds to its final, inevitable outcome.

The sets for this production came from the Virginia Opera. They captured well the atmosphere of the Latin Quarter. One can vouch for this because even in the 1960s ancient buildings, home to the poorer levels of French society, were propped up by huge wooden pools that jutted into the narrow quartier latin streets to stop them from tumbling over - and one will not be surprised in the least if some of these still exist today. The garret looks like so many seen during visits to painters’ studios on the Left Bank, and the café has the appearance of so many that one can find throughout Paris. There are some aspects of Paris that seem timeless and unchanging even if modern buildings sprout up everywhere.

Puccini set the opera in the 1830s. It premiered in Turin, Italy in 1896, at a time when Paris was renowned for the artists who relished the bohemian life style. Opera Ontario, however, took a different approach. It placed the action into the Paris of 1943, when food was scarce, and people suffered in general from depravation because of the on-going war and Nazi military occupation. On the surface, that seems to fit well. But, that is where the fit ends. Whoever created this adaptation– no credit is given– did not research history well, nor did the costume designer.

In the café we have a mingling of locals with German soldiers. That’s okay. But, then we observe an officer sharing a table and clinking glasses with a common soldier, an improbability in the Nazi German army of that time, perhaps even now. The common soldiers’ uniforms and caps make them look like Russian soldiers of that period. There is a sign that correctly identifies the way to the washroom with the letters 'W.C.' (for water closet) on a door that also leads to the kitchen – anyone who knows Paris, knows this is certainly not unusual – and then someone felt the need to put the word, 'Toilettes' underneath these initials. Why? Public washrooms in France are to this day known as WCs. Were you to ask some French person where to find la toilette, the person would look at you with a typically French smirk at the ignorance of foreigners. This kind of action by the opera's production team is a form of talking down to the audience. Surely, Canadians are more sophisticated than to have to be told what WC stands for on a French door.

Then we see Alcindoro. He has been dressed in a uniform that roughly imitates that of a Nazi officer, but it is in khaki, a colour never used by the Nazi Army, nor was the red and gold banding featured on his jacket and cap. Had the adaptor turned Alcindoro into a Vichy collaborator, wearing the typical kepi with its round, flat top, and had he worn a Vichy uniform, this transformation from a rich, elderly nobleman to a military man might have almost worked.

But from the start, things do not ring true to the period, although the costumes of the young bohemians capture the war period into which this production has been set. But, we are now dealing with war-time France under Nazi and Vichy rule. No bohemians, young men of fighting age, would have remained living in garrets. If not the Nazi themselves, then Pétain’s henchmen would have collared them. Marcello, painting what looked like abstracts, would have had to flee France to practice this 'degenerate' art. When Schaumard arrives in Act 1 bringing food and wine bought with money earned from a job playing music for an English lord, the antenna went up. Can one really believe that an English lord would have been able to live freely in the Paris of 1943?

In Act 2, Musetta ends up making a fool of Alcindoro by sticking him with the bill for the food her friends had eaten at the café. In France of the 19^th century, aristocrats were frequently cuckolded and made to look foolish by popular courtesans, but one doubts very much that a Nazi officer would have tolerated this act of riducle and betrayal. Perhaps, one could say that on Christmas Eve even the most unsympathetic of Nazis turned into a sentimental fool, because to Germans Christmas Eve is the most special of all festivals. But, still, this writer could not set aside disbelief. Also, in this scene, one wonders why steel-helmeted soldiers suddenly appear on an already over-crowded stage. Their action seemingly aids Musetta’s flight with her friends from her sugar daddy by pushing people away from the café. Why the show of force in a scene that in its original had no aggression? It, instead, offered a military band to create the chance for the bohemians to leave the café, not violence.

Act 3, as staged in this production, is very confusing. A few weeks have passed and it is now 1944, snow is falling and spring is yet a little while off. There is a toll boom at stage left, which is raised and lowered by German soldiers to let in street cleaners and market girls, who must show passes to get through from stage left to stage right. Yet, there we have Marcello, Rudolfo and Mimi walking back and forth in this area without ever being stopped. What was all this about? Paris was the jewel in Hitler’s fantasized crown and people moved freely around in it, except those whom the Vichy considered undesirables. The set at stage right, although it accurately depicts an old, rundown hotel, propped up in the manner described above, is with everything else in the foreground overshadowed by the background of the arch of a cast iron bridge. Paris has numerous bridges, joining the Left Bank to the Right Bank, the latter being the swankier part of the city. Having explored the Left Bank thoroughly and traversed many of the bridges that cross the Seine, I don’t recall a single metal arch. Of course, the set designer may have had in mind that the scene took place in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, but that is even worse. The area around this landmark has long been cleared of all housing and sits in a park setting.

In this production, Act 4 is supposed to take place just after de Gaulle marched into the city at the head of the Allied troops that freed France. Paris is sweltering in heat and there is a wonderfully, boisterous scene staged between the four friends, who have turned into boys in their celebration. Then Musetta arrives with Mimi, now very ill, in desperate need of medicine. Musetta sacrifices her jewelry and sets out with Schaumard to find this medicine and a doctor. While she is gone Colline sings his by now famous song of farewell to his winter coat, excellently executed by Savtchenko, to help raise the necessary funds.

Musetta’s departure and subsequent re-appearance with the needed medicine and promise of a doctor, is totally incongruous in a setting of Paris 1944 after the arrival of the Allies. Musetta, having openly cavorted with the enemy, would have had her hair shorn off within hours of the liberators’ arrival as punishment for her association with the hated enemy. The French showed no mercy to such women.

Because these events took place within living memory of many people, there is a need to stick to the true historical events. Perhaps, when those who still remember and know have all gone, than stage designers, story adaptors and directors can play all they want with history and its events, even trivialize them. But not yet! So, having said all this, and made myself a stickler in many eyes, I have to conclude with saying that all of my objections meant nothing to the West Coast visitor. To her, everything was perfect. Never having witnessed war, not knowing Paris, she did not even have to attempt to set aside disbelief. I, for one, simply closed my eyes when things seemed to make little sense, and let the music and the voices enrapture me and ended up having a wonderful musical evening, if not a theatrical one.

La Bohème continues at Hamilton Place Oct. 24 and 26, 2002. It will also be performed at The Centre In the Square, Kitchener, on Nov. 1 at 8 p.m.

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