La Bohème

Young hearts burn bright in the love story that inspired Moulin Rouge.

When Mimì and Rodolfo’s hands first meet in a small apartment on a freezing Parisian night, the pair fall for each other immediately. Swept up in the impulsiveness of youth, the embroiderer and poet embark on a wine-fuelled romance. As the pair navigate Paris’s nightlife, artists, musicians and lovelorn benefactors, their futures become inseparably entwined.

The youthful universality of Puccini’s La Bohème has maintained its relevance essentially uninterrupted since its Turin premiere in 1896. Its story of rag-tag artists attempting to scrounge a full life from their work, one that’s often beyond their means, can be transposed onto the lives of young people from any era. And their respective romantic dramas embody the obsession, passion and jealousy that make young love irresistible.

Opera Australia’s new staging of La Bohème reimagines one of the world’s favourite operas with fresh vitality. Award-winning director Dean Bryant (Anything Goes, Sweet Charity) fully embraces the rush and exhilaration of its bohemian setting and conjures the bittersweet, fleeting feeling of youthful invincibility.

Sung in Italian with English subtitles and performed with a live chamber orchestra. Directed by Dean Bryant