La Bohème

Franco Zeffirelli's well-known, indeed famous production has been on the repertoire of the Vienna State Opera for more than half a century. Generations of opera-goers have followed the tragic and cheerful lives of the young people in an atmospheric and detailed stage setting. Zeffirelli tells the story of the tender budding of love between Mimì and Rodolfo with a view of the couple that is as touching as it is unpathetic, occasionally mixing in comedy - which is not too heavy-handed - and offering picturesque images in the crowd scenes in order to skillfully capture the winter mood in the third scene, which is also expressed musically. His setting of the tragic finale is a prime example of skillful restraint: we see people on stage whose suffering not only touches us, but hits us - there is no better way to capture Puccini's masterpiece in images.