Pérez and Pati lift Lyric Opera’s routine “Bohème”
As if there wasn’t enough youthful revelry in the Loop Saturday night with carousing St. Patrick’s Day celebrants clad in Kelly green, La Bohème returned to the Lyric Opera stage for a four-week run.
Puccini’s tune-packed tale of young Parisian artists, love, comedy, romance, and tuberculosis is about as titanium a piece of musical theater as exists.
And so it proved again Saturday, where after a slow start, two talented principals lifted a routine Puccini night into a successful evening—no mean feat with pedestrian conducting and stage direction that hovered between amateurish and appalling.
Born in Chicago, Ailyn Pérez returned for her third appearance at Lyric Opera following Elixir of Love and Faust (where her company debut as Marguerite was hobbled, literally, by a ridiculous production).
Mimi has become a signature role for Pérez and she brought the requisite star power both vocally and dramatically. At times the soprano overdid the girlishness in the first two acts with Mimi seeming more hyperactive than endearing. What happened to the shy and lonely seamstress?
Yet she sang a glowing “Mi chiamano Mimi” and her portrayal rose in depth and dramatic strength as the opera unfolded. Her rich-toned and expressive “Donde liete usci” was the vocal highlight of the evening, and Pérez sang and acted with subtle and touching sensitivity in the tragic final act.
Pene Pati is making debuts at major houses this season including Lyric and the Met (as the Duke in Rigoletto). The Samoan tenor possesses a pleasing voice, vibrant and flexible yet he got off to a mixed start as Rodolfo. While he nailed a secure top C in “Che gelida manina” his hectoring phrasing lacked a smooth legato line with an oddly squawked note on the way up to the aria’s previous A flat.
That may have been due to nerves since, like nearly everything in this show, the tenor improved after the first act, vocalizing with greater ease and fluency. Pati sang strongly, if a bit vociferously, in Act III and blended beautifully with Pérez in the closing music of reconciliation. A big man, Pati moved gracefully on stage; he acted credibly and seemed to have a simpatico rapport with Pérez—as much as one could tell from Row Q, where the singers’ facial expressions were indiscernible.
Gabriella Reyes’ Musetta was in the modern mode of over-the-top excess, though she sang a resplendent “Quando men’ vo” and brought a compensating sympathy for Mimi in the final act.
Best known for contemporary works like Fire Shut Up in My Bones, Will Liverman seemed miscast as Marcello. While acting forcefully, the baritone proved vocally underpowered in the role’s big moments, not least the Cafe Momus climax of Act II, which proved less than rousing opening night.
It’s not often one walks out of a Bohème performance dazzled by the Schaunard. Ian Rucker, a third-year Ryan Center member from Oshkosh, displayed a big, warm-toned baritone, natural ease, and charismatic stage presence. One couldn’t help feeling that this was a voice and singer better suited to Marcello.
Peixen Chen completed the Bohemian quartet as Colline. While he sang in a robust bass, Chen brought little feeling to his uniformly loud “Vecchia zimarra.” Levi Hernandez, however, was wonderfully characterful in his contrasted comprimario turns as Benoit and Alcindoro.
Most of the show’s problems came from the pit and the production side.
Mediocre conductors can always count on a return ticket to Lyric Opera. Jordan de Souza made an unimpressive company debut in Florencia en el Amazonas four years ago and his direction of Bohème was on the same bland level: crucial dynamic and scoring details sloughed over, little fire or intensity, and pallid, underpowered climaxes. The Lyric Opera Orchestra soldiered on professionally but the musicians sounded dispirited as well as strangely light in sonority.
Worse still was the stage direction by Melanie Bacaling in her company debut. In addition to falling into the usual traps when directing this opera—extras and chorus members merely standing around in Act II, and the Bohemians’ hi-jinx being silly without actually being funny—Bacaling contributed several lapses of her own.
The first act was so darkly lit one could barely make out the principals’ faces from more than ten rows back. A bright spotlight was suddenly turned on halfway through Act II, wavered hesitantly on the singers before vanishing again. Parpignol’s wagon and the kids and choral women were plopped center stage blocking the principal singers. Finally, after Colline sings his coat song on the stairs outside the garret, he turns to address Schaunard who is nowhere in sight. (Ian Rucker had to quickly race down the stairs.) This level of staging ineptitude would not pass muster at a high school Battle of the Bands.
Herbert Ross’s antediluvian production from LA Opera looks its 32 years but has some clever moments and eye-catching visuals. The problem was not the sets’ age but the bizarre scenic layout. More than half of the set for the outer acts is devoted to the exterior outside of the artists’ building. The Bohemians’ tiny garret is high on a second level like a Joseph Cornell box, moving the opera’s intimate action far away from the audience.
The Lyric Opera Chorus looked light in numbers for the Cafe Momus ensembles but sang with worthy polish and energy.
La Bohème runs through April 12. lyricopera.org
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2 Responses to “Pérez and Pati lift Lyric Opera’s routine “Bohème””
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Posted Mar 16, 2025 at 10:29 pm by Fiona
Correct on all points. The production was boring and trite, almost laughably so.
Miss Perez and Mr Pati were convincing as Mimi and Rodolfo. However, their duets lasted forever, it was hard to believe that these were two young ardent lovers.
Ian Rucker is a superstar in the making. Too bad the Lyric did not make history by casting him as Marcello.
Posted Mar 21, 2025 at 8:55 am by John
I fully agree about the dreadful conducting.Boheme must move forward at all points, but the conducting for the critical Act I solos and duet was unbearably slow. This is not Wagner, and the conductor is not Karajan.
Totally disagree about the singing. The tenor had some warmth and power in the mid and upper-mid range; very little ability to project when singing softly and very little warmth. Perez was OK but no much more. The Musetta was absurd, and the Marcello was totally out of his depth. Disappointing all way round.