Director's Notes and Synopsis
DIRECTOR'S NOTES:
The following notes were written by Baz Luhrmann and were featured in the Opening Night on Broadway Playbill for La Bohème:
Thirteen years ago, the Australian Opera approached us about mounting a
production of La Bohème - their aim was to attract
a new, and perhaps younger, audience to opera. Our mission was to work with a young cast
and to address this near 100-year-old work as if it were being presented for the very
first time.
We set out on a six-month research and development tour to Torre del Lago, Italy, where
Puccini composed the opera, then to Paris, the city in which the story is set. Being young
and fairly bohemian, we immersed ourselves in the world that Henri Murger inhabited when
he wrote the play Scenes de la Vie de Bohème, on
which the opera is based. During this period, we came to realize that Puccini, by adapting
a wildly popular, risque play for the opera, had clearly set out to create a work that
would appeal to everyone. After all, Italian opera was mainstream entertainment, virtually
the television of its time.
At the conclusion of making Moulin Rouge, we committed to a new production of La Bohème which, although it was to be a new
interpretation, was realized in the spirit of the original 1990 production. Again we found
ourselves asking the questions: How do we make the opera as direct, accessible, funny and
emotionally engaging as it was to the first audiences in 1896? A first step was to help a
contemporary audience understand who the characters were by making them visually
accessible. Bohemians of the 1840s typically wore large, floppy velvet hats, ZZ Top beards
and checkered pants, while the girls looked somewhat like Little Bo Peep. We decided to
reset our production from that period to the relative match of the Left Bank world of
Paris, 1957 - the jazz clubs and cafes of Sartre, Nico and Sagan. This was also
necessarily a time in which death by tuberculosis was still a credible reality.
Our next step was to cast young players close to the ages of their characters in Scenes de la Vie de Bohème. These singers in their mid-20s would have to be vocally exceptional and have the acting ability to reveal the inner life of their character through song. Because of the vocal demands of the score, each lead player could only perform their role safely three shows a week. Our Broadway cast would need to perform eight times a week, and so we required, at a minimum, three sets of lead players. Travelling the globe and auditioning more than 2,000 singers over a two-year period, we were able to bring together some of the world's finest young singers from as far away as China, Russia, the UK, Europe, Canada and, of course, the USA.
Our final issue was that the opera was written in Italian, which could alienate a contemporary Broadway audience. There was no question of translating the libretto into English, for the shape and form of the Italian was essential to the resonance of the music. Many opera companies overcome this issue by projecting an English translation above the stage. These subtitles can sometimes end up being overly formal direct translations. We needed to pursue a supertitle philosophy that would make this production as accessible as possible. So, working with an Italian language coach and using a word-for-word translation as a reference point, the writing team, in conjunction with the singers, distilled the Italian into the spirit of what was being said using a 1950s vernacular. There are anachronisms and sometimes leaps of the imagination - for instance, a carriage in the original libretto is now a Rolls Royce. The intention behind this is the same as the motivation behind all of our choices: to open doors to the sublime experience that is Puccini's music and the universal story of La Bohème.
________________________________
SYNOPSIS:
(as featured in the Opening Night on
Broadway Playbill for La Bohème)
ACT ONE: Christmas Eve - 1957 - Paris -
A rooftop garret
Rodolfo, an impoverished young poet, and his best friend Marcello, a painter, complain of
the bitter cold as they try to work. They are joined by empty-handed philosopher Colline,
who has failed to pawn his books on Christmas Eve. Suddenly the doors burst open and
Schaunard, the musician of the group, returns triumphantly bearing food, drink and wood
for the fire. After duping their landlord out of the rent again, the bohemian boys decide
to hit the town and celebrate Christmas Eve. Rodolfo stays behind to finish his article. A
blackout brings Rodolfo's next-door neighbor, a beautiful young girl called Mimi, to his
door in search of a light for her candle. Unexpectedly she faints, and when revived she
finds that she has lost her key. Searching together in the pale moonlight, Mimi and
Rodolfo fall in love.
ACT TWO: Christmas Eve - 1957 - Paris -
The Left Bank - Cafe Momus
At Cafe Momus, the happening heart of the bohemian scene, Rodolfo introduces Mimi to his
boisterous friends. They eat, drink and discuss love and life. The fabulous Musetta, queen
of the streets and Marcello's old lover, arrives with a fawning old English sugar-daddy.
By the end of the night Marcello and Musetta have reunited, and together with Mimi,
Rodolfo and the bohemians, they disappear into the crowd, leaving the flabbergasted
sugar-daddy to pay their check.
ACT THREE: February - 1958 -
French-Belgian border - Customs checkpoint
It is a bleak, wintery dawn. Marcello and Musetta are living above a tavern called Au Port
de Marseille while Marcello earns a living signwriting. A visibly ill Mimi seeks out
Marcello. She explains that Rodolfo has ended their relationship, and she is unclear why.
She begs Marcello's help. Later, when Marcello confronts Rodolfo about the breakup, he
learns of Rodolfo's real fear - Mimi's illness and that his poverty makes things worse.
Mimi overhears the truth, but when the lovers confront each other they cannot bear to part
until the spring.
ACT FOUR: Late June - 1958 - Paris - The
same rooftop garret
The sun is setting on a beautiful summer day. Marcello and Rodolfo are working outdoors.
They are no longer with Musetta and Mimi and are tortured by their lost loves. Schaunard
and Colline arrive with an underwhelming meal of bread and herring. The boys are making
the best of it when, suddenly, Musetta bursts in with the news that Mimi is close to
death. Once Mimi has been helped inside, the bohemians go off to do what they can for the
ailing girl. Alone, Rodolfo and Mimi reminisce about happier times. Mimi eventually falls
asleep. Awaiting the arrival of the doctor, Rodolfo and the boys attempt to block the
harsh sunlight. One by one, the bohemians realize the painful truth as Rodolfo calls out
in anguish and falls upon Mimi's lifeless body.
________________________________
