10 - 16 January 2002
Issue No.568
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Al-Ahram Weekly Online 10 - 16 January 2002 Issue No.568 |
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In Cairo Opera House this week, it was time for Giacomo Puccini's La Bohème once again. Performed at the Main Hall by the Cairo Opera Company and Choir and the Cairo Opera Orchestra from 3 to 7 January, the production was organised in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Centre.
photo: Sherif Sonbol
The opera, whose libretto was written by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, is based on incidents from Henri Murger's autobiographical novel Scènes de la vie de Bohème. Although, as Puccini's romantic masterpiece, it is a major classic of the Italian repertoire, La Bohème's world premiere in Turin in February 1896 met with a lukewarm response from audience and critics alike. Its Metropolitan premiere in New York in 1900 didn't fare much better; the Tribune's reviewer went so far as to write that "La Bohème is foul in subject and fulminant and futile in its music," finding it "silly and inconsequential." Who would have thought?
Set in 1830s Paris, in the winter, La Bohème's four acts depict the story of a group of poverty-stricken Bohemians: Marcello, an artist; Rodolfo, a poet; Colline, a philosopher; and Schaunard, a musician.
Rodolfo falls in love with the neighbour, the beautiful seamstress Mimi. The most famous of this opera's arias is Che gelida manina ("your tiny hand is frozen") at the end of the first act in which Rodolfo, holding Mimi's hands for the first time, tells her about his life and his work. And in response Mimi sings an equally famous aria Mi chiamano Mimi ("They call me Mimi"). The couple's encounter develops into a romantic affair. Marcello, in the meantime, is reunited with his former girlfriend Musetta; but this relationship, by contrast, is full of bickering and quarrelling. The group enjoys merry evenings at the Café Momus with their girlfriends. But Mimi -- sickly and coughing from the start -- soon falls ill. Her health deteriorates and the friends all try to nurse her and buy her medicine. But in a touching scene with all four Bohemians and Musetta, now no longer merry or cheerful, around her, Mimi breathes her last.
In this, the Cairo Opera House's latest production, directed by Gihan Morsi and conducted by Ivan Filev, Iman Mustafa and Tahiyya Shamseddin alternately took on the role of Mimi, Giuseppe Morino played Rodolfo, Raouf Zeidan was Marcello while Caroline Dumas, Dalia Farouk and Nashwa Ibrahim alternately played Musetta. Reda El-Wakil and Ashraf Seweilam alternately played Colline, while Mustafa Mohamed played Schaunard.
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