La Boheme in Florence, Scenography and costumes by Francesco Zito

FLORENCE:   Even if you can’t count how many times you have heard it on record or on stage, La Bohème by Giacomo Puccini is every time a comfort for the audience and touches the right cord of our heart. Life, thoughtlessness, pain, youth, love, everyday things: a part of our world too. Now, in the so called “mature” age, we appreciate it very much, as a part of us that is lost in an irreparable way.

We can hear Giacomo Puccini’s love for his own characters in some melodies, in some moments when the orchestra “embraces” the voices, so that we can understand how the musician supports them. They are also a part of his own life, the garret in the first and last act of La Bohème is the same of his youth’s home in Lucca. In the circle of young and penniless friends created by Illica and Giacosa we can find easily the young “maestrino” Puccini going to Milan to try his fortune.
The production which is in these days in Florence, is in repertoire of Teatro Comunale, where it’s already been seen in recent years. Thanks to the stage designer Francesco Zito, the opera takes place in the years when Puccini wrote it, at the end of 19^th century. In the whole, the production is rather fine, also if everything was “too” tidy: the boys have no money to live, but their “poor room” looks more like a cozy flat looking Paris’ roofs… So, also the costumes look too elegant for poor students and their “small world” in Paris at that time, and it seems they came out from Paris’ fashion atelier.

La Boheme in Florence, The second act at Momus.

The production by Mario Pontiggia is altogether very traditional, and we see what we expect going to see La Bohéme, but in general the idea has something fake in itself, not only because everything seems too rich, but something is contradictory, specially in the first and last act. At Cafè Momus the toy-seller Parpignol is like a Neapolitan traditional character, coming with (why?) two Arlecchino masks (Arlecchino is not a neapolitan mask). Altogether the third act was the best one, as it is staged and also musically, with a nice duetto among Rodolfo and Mimì, and the quartetto at the end, even if Carmela Remigio’s Mimì is a bit too cold showing her emotions.
Rodolfo was Lorenzo Decaro, a young tenor who has a pleasant burnished voice in the medium, but with many problems in the upper register. He is scenically rather reliable, and the character of Rodolfo comes out in a rather good way.

As said, Carmela Remigio was Mimì, but Puccini’s writing is rather problematic for her

. She hasn’t the large expressivity in wide musical phrases written by Puccini, their fervour and their emotional involving. Her Mimì is cold and few expressive, almost emotionally frigid.

Alessandra Marianelli as Musetta shows her accurate and correct voice, even if the role isn’t perfectly characterized. Simone Del Savio has been a very good Schaunard with a good voice and technique. Rather correct were also Stefano Antonucci as Marcello, Marco Vinco as Colline, and all the rest of the cast.

Carlo Montanaro, conductor, payed attention to the orchestra and to its colours, more than following the singers with imagination and flexibility as they needed, so that sometimes they looked don’t find the necessary cohesion with him. The Chorus has been quite accettable.

In general, a nice performance, even if there were no great vocal personalities among the singers (but where are they, in today’s opera world?): at the end, Puccini is always a winner.

La Boheme, Poster

LA BOHÈME, Opera. Music: Giacomo Puccini. Libretto: Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica.

Giacomo Puccini

Florence, Italy. Teatro Comunale december the 2nd, 2011

Cast: 

Rodolfo: LORENZO DECARO.   Mimì: CARMELA REMIGIO.

Marcello: STEFANO ANTONUCCI. Musetta: ALESSANDRA MARIANELLI.

Schaunard: SIMONE DEL SAVIO.  Colline: MARCO VINCO. Benoît / Alcindoro: ANDREA CORTESE.

Parpignol: LEONARDO MELANI. Sergente dei doganieri: VITO LUCIANO ROBERTI. Un doganiere: LISANDRO GUINIS.

ORCHESTRA E CORO DEL MAGGIO MUSICALE FIORENTINO I Ragazzi Cantori di Firenze diretti da: Marisol Carballo.

Conductor: CARLO MONTANARO
.

Regia: Mario Pontiggia, Scenography andcostumes: Francesco Zito, Light: Gianni Paolo Mirenda

Fabio Bardelli

(translation Bruno Tredicine)