Holly Stewart

Though it usually operates on a smaller scale, this week Opera McGill will debut a big-budget, big-cast version of what is arguably the world’s biggest-name opera: Giacomo Puccini’s La Bohème.

“It’s the world’s favourite opera, in some way,” says Patrick Hansen, the director of McGill’s Opera Studies program. “A lot of people would probably say it’s numero uno.”

Hansen’s relationship with the opera goes back to the beginning of his 30-year career, in which he has performed or viewed a scene or an entire production of the performance.

First performed in 1896, La Bohème is about bohemians in love in 1830s Paris. Part of the reason for its enduring popularity is its ability to speak to young people.

“The thing that really makes Bohème powerful is that it’s a story about young people: artists, musicians, painters, philosophers—you know, students,” Hansen says. “We could have [set] this in the McGill Ghetto. It would have been easy.”

Unlike most operas, La Bohème has made a number of leaps from the opera house into popular culture. Australian director Baz Luhrmann started his career with an updated production of it, and later reused parts of the sets in his Moulin Rouge! The music appeared in the 1987 romantic comedy Moonstruck, and the Broadway musical Rent is based on the story, even borrowing the names of the characters.

Philippe Sly, who will play Marcello, one of the two male leads, on January 26 and 29, said that he found a lot of common ground with his character.

“[Co-star Elias Berberian] and I decided we’re just going to play ourselves, have a good time on stage, and we know that will resonate quite profoundly,” he said.

In March, Sly will go to New York to compete with a few dozen other singers (selected from a pool of around 2,000) at the Metropolitan Opera House’s National Council Auditions contest.  

Though Hansen has done Bohème for 30 years, this particular production has some new dimensions. Most significantly, the orchestra will be on the stage as opposed to in the pit, which is too small for a full ensemble. Although that might sound trivial, it means big changes for the show’s basic dynamics.

“Everything about the production is about how to technically make that happen,” said Hansen.

The production will therefore feature some significant technical changes, the most important being that performers will interact with the conductor via screens stage right, stage left, and in front of the stage. “La Bohème via Skype, in a weird way,” Hansen said.

Though the scheme creates some challenges for the singers and musicians, in other senses Hansen said that it was the “easiest production [he] had ever directed,” because the cast is talented and because the script is easy to stage.

“The thing that’s great about Bohème is that there’s not a wasted moment. It’s so compact and so pithy,” he said.  “It’s almost made for ADHD folks … There’s not a moment where you sit there and go ‘Gosh, this has been going on for a while,’ because there’s always a new character, there’s always something happening.”

When asked for a final word on his show, Hansen did not hide his confidence.

“I can’t imagine a better production being done,” he said. “I just think that this is simply not to be missed. If [students] ever have thought for a moment, ‘I’m at university, I really ought to be taking in an opera for once in my life,’ they would come and actually be surprised at how amazing it is, how ingenious it is, and they might get hooked on it.”

La Bohème runs Jan. 26, 28, 29, 30, 7:30 p.m. at Pollack Hall.  Tickets are $22.