Intermezzo

ENO's Boheme half price

Tickets for the latest revival of ENO's La bohème are 50% off with a new Time Out offer.

This brings the dress circle price down to £41.50 and the front upper circle to £31 - but the best bargain has to be the back two rows of the upper circle at £12.50 (no subtitles visible). You won't get anything cheaper than that.

The main drawback with Time Out offers is that you don't find out which seats have been allocated until you pick up the tickets on the night - and £31+ for anything behind the front couple of rows is not a great bargain.

More ENO half price deals

ENO. Half price. Yet another offer.

LondonTheatreDirect.com have a very limited allocation of seats for La bohème, The Barber of Seville and Medea in all areas of the theatre at half price (plus £3 fee).

Ignore the 'save £29' and similar banners on the site, because most of the discounts are even higher. Just pick the number of seats you want for the selected date, and you are shown exactly which seat numbers are available, and how much they cost. Brilliant.

Bear in mind that, as ever, bigger discounts will probably be available on the day at the TKTS booth (availability not guaranteed).

Thanks to reader Grahame for spotting.

ENO's Barber and Boheme at half price

Here's something to make Jonathan Miller even grumpier. Get 50% off seats for his two upcoming ENO revivals, La bohème and The Barber of Seville, with DiscountTheatre.com.

Their ticket allocation includes Stalls, Dress Circle and Upper Circle, though not all areas are available for all dates. You don't get to pick your seats, but you are told exactly which ones have been allocated.

Bookings must be made by 2.30pm on Friday 15 February.

Thanks to reader Alison for spotting.

La boheme is back

La bohème - Royal Opera House, 17 December 2012

When Rodolfo sounds more consumptive than Mimì, you’ve got a problem. Post-surgery, Rolando Villazón has had his ups and downs, but he was singing much better in Salzburg this summer than he could manage last night in the 999th revival of John Copley's La bohème. The notes were (mostly) there; the volume wasn’t. Despite Mark Elder’s considerate restraint, the orchestra often washed over him, and he bottled a few key phrases, not to mention their money notes. I can only hope for Rolando’s sake it was just an off night, perhaps a touch of the respiratory lurgy that seemed to afflict half the audience.

Netrebko's dodgy tattoo

It seems there's more than one Russian singer with an unexplained tattoo.

Eagle eyed reviewers have spotted that Anna Netrebko is currently sporting a colourful piece of body art - on her neck.

They've speculated it's part of the punky persona she's created for Salzburg's new La bohème, in which she plays a thoroughly modern Mimi. Because it couldn't be a gesture of solidarity with her former classmate Evgeny Nikitin - could it?

Anna in Wonderland

Has director Damiano Michieletto been at the 'special' mushrooms? His new La bohème for the Salzburg Festival has an Alice in Wonderland feel. Sets are massively under or over scaled,  perspectives are distorted.

Anna Netrebko plays Mimi in a raspberry beret - the kind u find in a second hand store - and Nino Machaidze is Musetta in what look like the offcuts from Jonas Kaufmann's paw-worthy leopard print suit.

Roberto and Angela back for more

La bohème - Royal Opera House, 23 June 2012

The second of the two shows celebrating the 20th anniversary of Roberto Alagna and Angela Gheorghiu's first encounter was more musically accomplished than the first. And the curtains worked. But we were never allowed to forget why we were there. Like the first, the evening had the air of a football testimonial - two sides, singers and orchestra, battling it out for the greater glory of the stars.

Now we are 20 - Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna 2gether 4eva

La bohème - Royal Opera House, 19 June 2012

 

Last night marked 20 years since Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna first clapped eyes on each other in some obscure crevice of the Royal Opera House.

To celebrate this momentous occasion, a fount of scurrilous gossip and hilarious candids ever since, Covent Garden have mounted two special performances of La bohème, the John Copley production that is even older than the famed couple's relationship. This was the first.

Angela opens wide

One of a series of photos taken during rehearsals for this week's La bohème at the Royal Opera House - more on Angela's Facebook page.

BBC interrupt service

In what I suspect is a Covent Garden first, the Royal Opera House will interrupt Saturday night's performance of La bohème so that the BBC can film the finale to their Maestro at the Opera competition. 

Once Act 2 of the real show is done, Maestro Bychkov will make way for the BBC's contest winner, who will 'conduct' another Act 2, this time purely for the BBC's cameras. After this, the real show will resume with Act 3.

This arrangement avoids the need to build the complex Act 2 set twice in one night. But it may not go down well with certain customers, or to be totally accurate, their husbands. They had expected the filming to begin after Act 4, leaving them free to escape it altogether and go home at a more reasonable hour.

Luckily there are usually some highly-recommended divorce lawyers in the audience.

Thanks to reader hippoes for pursuing this with the ROH:

 

 

La boheme - back again at the Royal Opera House

La bohème - Royal Opera House, 30 April 2012

Which performer in Covent Garden’s La bohème not only gets carried on and off stage, but even has a stand-in for rehearsals? 

No, Angela’s not here yet. I’m talking about the adorable Puffin, who plays Musetta’s fluffy white Pomeranian. 

Yet another Mimi

Following Anja Harteros's abrupt departure, her replacement Celine Byrne has now pulled out of the the Royal Opera House’s forthcoming La bohème.

'Health reasons' are cited, though the press release doesn't say exactly what she's sick of, or how she's so sure she won't be better by opening night, 30 April.

The next plucky soprano to try her luck is Carmen Giannattasio.

Herheim's La bohème on DVD

According to the ever-reliable Per-Erik of Wagneropera.net, Stefan Herheim's new Oslo production of La bohème is to be released on DVD in May 2012.

It may end up on YouTube a bit earlier than that though - it'll be beamed into Norwegian cinemas on 4 February and is also expected to be shown on TV some time in March.

Stefan Herheim's La boheme

Stefan Herheim's new production of La bohème opened in Oslo last week.

Herheim begins with Mimi's death and uses the opera to examine Rodolfo's reaction to it. The concept is explained in more detail in a Wagneropera.net interview with Alexander Meier-Dörzenbach, the production's dramaturg. 

Shoreditch Boheme could be catching

It couldn't have come at a more queasily appropriate time. As Spanish cucumbers ravage European bowels, Vignette Productions announce their new production of La Bohème, where Mimi's tuberculosis is replaced by a deadly virus. Their aim? "...to make the fear of contagion palpable and affecting to a 21st century audience".

Following last year's Così fan tutte (much admired by readers who got to see it), Vignette return with a young cast and trimmed-down band to the Village Underground in Shoreditch on 26 and 28 July. The production, we are warned, "immerses the public in the action". 

Just don't touch the cucumber sandwiches.

Tickets (£35) here.

 

ENO cut La boheme - UPDATED with another offer

 
 
If you've grown out of playing Sweary Sparklers, how about a heavily discounted trip to ENO's La bohème on Guy Fawkes Night instead?

Courtesy of Travelzoo, Dress Circle seats worth £80 or £71 are going for £20 and Upper Circle seats are £15 instead of £51 or £36 for the 5 November performance only.

Book by phone with ENO on 0871 472 0800, quoting promo code TZBOHEME, or online using the same code (at the time of writing, Travelzoo warn that the online code is not yet active).

Thanks to Howard for spotting this one.

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* UPDATE *  another and even better offer. From Debenhams (?!?!?) 

Pink seats in the Dress Circle are £20, Yellow seats in the Upper Circle are £15 and any seat in the Balcony is £10 if you use the code ENODEB when booking online. Valid for all remaining performances.

the oldest show in town

La Bohème - Bayerische Staatsoper, Nationaltheater, Munich, 30 December 2009

Otto Schenk's Munich Bohème, which recently celebrated its fortieth birthday, proves that a traditional production if thoughtfully crafted needn't have a sell-by date. From a glance at the photos, it doesn't look that different from Covent Garden's slightly younger yet markedly more tired effort. What sets it apart are the details. It's sensitive to the emotional temperature of the music, attentive to the text, and doesn't indulge in gratuitous additions. Nobody just stands there and barks out their lines across the stage. When Rodolfo and Mimi fall in love, they move closer together. When she's in bed dying, his arm supports her.

What is particularly successful is that even on the packed stage of the second act, the eye is unerringly directed towards the action. Not earth-shattering stuff but it takes great skill.  A novice could follow the action without understanding the words or knowing the plot. The production illustrates the story, which is the one and only selling point of the traditional style. Otherwise it's just a concert performance with a twee backdrop. Mentioning no names.

Under Asher Fisch the orchestra were sleekly assured. Not the most detailed or dramatically exhilarating performance I've ever heard, but a beautifully balanced and mature reading.

This particular run is outstandingly well-cast, and there were some superb performances. All were slow to find their voices - we had to wait until the third act for Anja Harteros's wobbles to settle and her sweet and touching Mimi to blossom. I could forgive a little shoutiness from Levente Molnár's big-hearted joy of a Marcello, and Musetta's petulant charm was captured perfectly in the beautiful silvery soprano of Elena Tsallagova, a name to watch out for. But Massimo Giordano's Rodolfo stole the show, a reminder that the real tragedy in La Bohème is not Mimi's death, but Rodolfo's loss. Giordano's grief radiated across the auditorium - I wonder if anyone managed to stem a tear.

*****   more photos on next page   *****

LOL Boheme

La bohème - Royal Opera House, 23 December 2009

I was crying at the end of this Bohème alright. With laughter. Had Musetta sacrificed more than her earrings for Mimì? Let's just say the resemblance between the proffered fluffy white muff and her show-stealing Act 2 canine companion* was a striking one.
(*'Pickle' the German Spitz, per programme).

But it's the least of this dreadful old production's problems. Where do I start? The artist who can't afford to eat but can pay a nude model? The door which supposedly leads to a staircase placed in what is clearly an external wall ?  The wagon which rocks throughout the Act 3 prelude then spills out a flustered couple at its end (a 'colourful' addition unsupported by either music or libretto)? The vast distance between Rodolfo and Mimì as he sings of gazing on her face?  Even the welcome sight of Kostas Smoriginas in his underpants was, on mature and objective reflection, gratuitous, though it pains me to admit it. I won't go on. Cinematic style realism, which is this production's aim, relies on getting the details right - all of them. No amount of gasp-inducing fake snow can cover that up.

Some productions are traditional in a good sense. They respect the music and the words, and deal with both honestly if unimaginatively. But this one is simply tired, lazy and past it. I can only guess at what sort of internal politics keep it on the schedules.

The music was some compensation for the torture of the visuals. Andris Nelsons, on the third of his five nights, began brilliantly. The first two acts displayed a chamber-like grasp of colour and detail. Every single note mattered. His dynamic range was broad and bold, his daring luftpausen perfectly judged to highlight what followed without losing track of what had passed. The orchestra played beautifully for him, as well as they have for Pappano and Bychkov in recent months. Something changed after the interval though. The exuberance had faded, the lustrous detail was blurred. Still perfectly good, just not quite as emotionally gripping. I didn't, incidentally, notice any of the pit/stage co-ordination problems some of the first night reviewers commented on.

The cast too is a solid one. Although there was an air of routine to Piotr Beczala's Rodolfo, he stepped up a gear to project his big numbers with more ardour. Hibla Gerzmava was a strong Mimì, perhaps too robust to be entirely sympathetic. Gabriele Viviani (Marcello), Inna Dukach (Musetta), Jacques Imbrailo (Schaunard) and Kostas Smoriginas (Colline) completed the well-rounded central ensemble, the only small complaint being a certain similarity between the voices of Hibla Gerzmava and Inna Dukach. They deserve a better show.

Production photos here.

Covent Garden La Boheme in photos

Rehearsal pics featuring the first cast of the current revival - Piotr Beczala (Rodolfo), Hibla Gerzmava (Mimì),  Gabriele Viviani (Marcello), Jacques Imbrailo (Schaunard) and Kostas Smoriginas (Colline).

Listen to director John Copley and conductor Andris Nelsons discuss the production on Radio 3's InTune here.

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Netrebko and Villazon in Xmas day TV Boheme

Get your hankies ready. Robert Dornhelm's exquisite film of La Bohème, starring Anna Netrebko and Rolando Villazón, is to be shown on BBC2 on Xmas day at 4.10pm.

Though shot in a studio, with the soundtrack's Marcello and Schaunard substituted by more camera-friendly faces, the movie has a truthfulness rarely found in stage productions. This is mostly down to the central performances - how wise (in retrospect) Dornhelm was to create this testament to the partnership at the height of their powers.

But it also helps that he has spared no expense to communicate poverty. The clothes are shabby, the apartment is a dump, possessions are few. The richness of the characters' inner lives is highlighted by contrast. We understand that their dreams are all they have to live for. And more depressingly we learn that love and art are as nothing if you don't have money. The camera is always pointed in the same direction as the music, and perfectly responsive to it. Dornhelm apparently has no operatic training but it's hard to believe. Possibly the greatest opera movie since Syberberg's Parsifal.

Bertrand de Billy conducts the great Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and Vienna State Opera bigmouth Intendant Ioan Holender makes a cameo appearance as Alcindoro.

Here's a preview:

and here's an interview with Anna: