BIENVENUE A PARIS

The lives of four young bohemians are the focus of Puccini's heartbreaking opera, the work that launched a thousand adaptations and became the origin of the groundbreaking hit musical RENT. Living life in poverty, the characters fall in and out of love in the city of love, navigating a life less ordinary and trying to find light in the darkness. Although the struggle and strife (and excitement) of 1840's Paris may seem worlds away to us now, the themes have remained timeless and universal.

Directed by Kathleen Belcher this production by the Portland Opera features Italian tenor Giordano Luca who makes his stateside debut as Rodolfo, alongside Vanessa Isiguen as Mimi.

WHO ARE THE BOHEMIANS?

Since the nineteenth Century, people have been referring to bohemians, who were usually artists, musicians and writers who lived life for the experience (and the absinthe.) The characters of La Boheme are just like that, down on luck and rent, but high on love and life. There's Roldofo and Mimi, an everlasting couple for whom struggle often gets in the middle, and Muschetta and Marcello, the outrageous, flirtatious ones who always seem to find their way back to each other. You can't fail to enjoy the riotous and charismatic tales of these wild young things!