Conductor // Wouter Padberg

Orchestra // Masha Iakovleva, eerste viool; Joanna Wronko, tweede viool; Lotte de Vries, altviool; Mick Stirling, cello; Sorin Orchischi, contrabas, Margreet Niks, fluit/piccolo; Anita Janssen, hobo/althobo; Frank van den Brink, klarinet/basklarinet; Margreet Bongers, fagot; José Sogorb, hoorn 1; Pierre Buizer, hoorn 2; Sven Berkelmans, trompet; Lennart de Winter, trombone/triangel/buisklok; Niek Kleinjan, pauken/slagwerk; Veronique Serpenti, harp/bekkens.

Director // Lotte de Beer

Set, Costume and Light design // Clement & Sanôu

With // Çiğdem Soyarslan, Andrew Owens, Ben Connor, Anna Maria Sarra, Igor Bakan, Oleg Loza and Richard Prada 

New production Theater an der Wien in der Kammeroper with Operafront.

La bohème //

In the original opera, this story begins with two artists who are so poor that they burn their self-written play only to be warm for a few moments in their cold apartment on Christmas eve. In our version these two live in a huge penthouse rented by their parents. On this night they have opened all the windows and walk around in their boxer shorts. Out of pure boredom, they burn up their just finished play and right after that the laptop that it was written on. They are not poor in this version. They are rich kids who have everything but who are poor in another way: They have too much. Too many choices, too much freedom and they are paralysed by the decadence of their existence. 

When his friends go off to a restaurant, Rodolpho stays behind. He tries to write something but has no inspiration. Then Mimi comes at the door. Immediately something changes. Mimi is different. She has a strong life energy about her which sweeps Rodolpho off his feet. Their love rises above any kind of bored nihilism. 

But as the piece continues we start to understand what's really going on with Mimi and how Rodolpho, the spoiled, protected kid, will deal with reality punching him in the face....