LA BOHÈME ROLLS ON

Saturday night I attended the Metropolitan Opera's 1,175th performance of Giacomo Puccini's La Bohème. I haven't been to quite all of them, but I have seen it a good number of times. It's my favorite. If anyone is unsure of whether to go to the opera, I would suggest La Bohème.

The story is pretty straight-forward (a rarity in opera). It's your basic boy gets girl, boy loses girl, girl comes back to boy and dies. (It's the basis for the story of Rent, now playing in a theater near you.) Set in the Latin Quarter of Paris in the 1840's (the East Village of its time), its characters are "bohemians"--young, penniless artists, poets, musicians, etc., not the usual upper-class movers and shakers who customarily populated the opera stage even in the late 19th century. The music is uncomplicated, I'd even say unsophisticated, compared to most of grand opera. The critics hated it, the audiences loved it--the Met has been filling the house and boosting its coffers with it since 1900.

Filmmaker Franco Zeffirelli did the production, which the Met has been using since the '70s at least, when I first saw it. His sets are spectacular, but I was surprised that only one of them got applause this time--audiences must be getting used to them. I remember when all three sets would get ovations, plus sometimes an additional one when the interior of Café Momus is revealed. There is much to delight the eye: a little pony or donkey pulling a vendor's cart, and a beautiful horse actually trotting across the stage, pulling a carriage bearing Mussetta for her grand entrance. A troop of soldiers preceded by a marching band parades down a huge flight of steps (stairways are a Zeffirelli signature--he puts them in every possible set).

The cast was more than adequate: Mimi was sung by the excellent Hei-kyung Hong (my wife took an extra copy of the program to give to her manicurist, who is always proud of her Korean heritage). The rest of the cast sang well, if not quite at Hong's level. And none of the starving artist bohemians was noticably fat, all too common among opera singers. Both Hong and Alexandra Deshorties, who played Musetta, are beautiful, easily making their attraction to the male characters believable.

As always, Mimi died in the last act, and as always, my eyes teared up, as Rodolfo cried out her name. Yes, it's a tear-jerker, but I love it.