It is the night before Christmas. It is cold and both wallets and stomachs are empty. To create some warmth, the poet Rodolfo sets fire to one of his manuscripts. He and his friends celebrate their tiniest achievements while turning their arguments with representatives of the narrow middle classes into a farce.  A poet, a painter, a musician, a philosopher – these are the bohemians that Giacomo Puccini portrays in his opera. Their life is one of transition, of certainty that night will always be followed by day and failure by success. In the midst of the most boisterous point of their quest for personal freedom, the tubercular Mimì enters Rodolfo’s life. And what transpires is that so rare and often dreamed of moment of love at first sight. However, along with Mimì death and cold reality also move in. In the spring the lovers part because Rodolfo is incapable of dealing with so much reality and Mimì does not want to impose on him. Nevertheless she will spend her final minutes among friends and in the arms of her lover.

Giacomo Puccini’s opera «La Bohème», first performed in 1896, remains one of his best-known works of music theatre. His melodies seduce and transport the listener into worlds which in «La Bohème» are characterised both by tragedy and a longing for love and unrestrained joie de vivre. The fleeting nature of the moment that cannot be captured, the transience and cyclical nature of existence in which death is always followed by life are particularly prominent in this opera. It is these elements that American director Daniel Kramer takes as the starting point for his interpretation of «La Bohème». Following Verdi’s «La traviata» in the 2017 / 2018 season, this is Kramer’s second production at Theater Basel. For the conductor Kristiina Poska «La Bohème» is the first opera production that she will conduct as Theater Basel’s Music Director.