Review: La boheme – Opera Australia 2015

Gale Edwards’ La bohème is in another return season for Opera Australia, and as a first-time viewing in the 2015 season, it sparkles like it was new.

Best known to legions of musical theatre fans as the inspiration for Rent, but known outside of that bubble as one of the most famous operas in the world, Puccini’s love story painted over with the brush of bohemia is light and affecting all at once.

Lorina Gore as Musetta in La Boheme. Photo by Branco Gaica.
Lorina Gore as Musetta in La Boheme. Photo by Branco Gaica.

Edwards’ production moves the story from 1830s Paris to 1930s Berlin, the end of the era of Weimar cabaret and a sense of artistic, sexual, and personal liberation, at least for a hot minute. There’s something so invigorating about that, and the story fits in perfectly – artists Rodolfo (Diego Torre) and Marcello (Andrew Jones) painting their walls and burning their writing for warmth. It’s sincere pretension, reckless bohemia, but it’s such good fun you forgive their affectations. Joined by friends Colline (David Parkin) and Schaunard (Shane Lowrencev), they are a rollicking good time.

The tragedy sneaks up on you. From the moment Rodolfo meets Mimi (Maija Kovalevska), it’s already coming; she is cold and coughing, unsteady, unwell. But Rodolfo lights her candle, and they light up for each other; a tender love story hampered only by Rodolfo’s jealousy and Mimi’s illness.

Edwards’ production manages to frame Rodolfo and Mimi’s story in perfect opposition with Marcello and Musetta’s (Lorina Gore); firebrand Musetta, who will do what she wants and gets what she wants, is as tempestuous, demanding, and relentless as Mimi is sweet-hearted and shy and loyal, and this has never been clearer than in Edwards’ staging of the third act. While Rodolfo and Mimi fall out, part, and ultimately reconcile, downstage, isolated, and still in a world of only each other, Marcello and Musetta are tearing each other apart, figuratively and very close to literally, behind them, framed by a giant doorway. Their passion brings forth with real clarity the quieter passionate rumblings in Rodolfo and Mimi’s locked gazes and the resulting tableau is beautiful.

Nothing beats the showstopper of the second act, however; the dazzling Musetta centre-stage at Cafe Momus, an explosion of little to no clothing and sensuality; sumptuous movement and swinging hips and free, ringing voices. Musetta is a bombshell, smiling a winning smile as she kicks Alcindro well into the distance to go a few more rounds with Marcello. The set is lavish and pulsating with life and energy. This second act demonstrates why people come to see this particular La bohème  again and again, no matter what diversity in programming could bring – who wouldn’t want to be caught up in Musetta’s magic over and over? In this way, the act mirrors Musetta herself: the irresistible.

Maija Kovalevska and Diego Torre in La boheme. Photo by Branco Gaica.
Maija Kovalevska and Diego Torre in La boheme. Photo by Branco Gaica.

Ultimately, of course, this is a tragedy, and in a genuinely sorrowful fourth act, it’s impossible to fight against it. Finally, attention must be paid to reality. Everyone is a little older in the face of something so final. Colline sells his favoured coat (Parkin manages to convey this parting with a real sense of gravitas), Musetta puts herself aside to help Mimi, and Rodolfo ages about fifty years in the final few moments, when he realises just how this love story he’s in is actually going to end.

Gore’s Musetta is an easy star of the production because her role is the flashiest and the most demanding of attention, but it’s also beautifully sung and accompanied with surprisingly strong acting; it’s hard not to fall for her. Diego Torre’s Rodolfo is reliably strong and settles into his character as the show progresses; he’s much stronger in the third or fourth acts than in the first two. Kovaleska, who has sung the part of Mimi in Paris and Vienna and New York and considers the part her signature, brings a warmth like fresh springtime to her voice that only becomes more striking as the weather grows colder around her and she becomes sicker.

It’s a simple story, but it’s so easy to fall into its spell and grow attached to it. With showstoppers and slow-building emotion, thisLa bohème  is a gem of a production.

Cassie Tongue

Cassie is a theatre critic and arts writer in Sydney, and was the deputy editor of AussieTheatre. She has written for The Guardian, Time Out Sydney, Daily Review, and BroadwayWorld Australia. She is a voter for the Sydney Theatre Awards.

Cassie Tongue

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