La bohème through the Ages

Discover the origins of the story and learn about the many adaptations of Puccini’s cherished opera.

Henry Murger publishes a series of stories about his experiences living as a bohemian in Paris. They’re adapted into a popular play in 1849 and collected into a volume two years later, titled Scènes de la vie de bohème.

Giacomo Puccini and his rival, composer Ruggero Leoncavallo, announce that
they are independently writing operas based on Murger’s stories. Puccini’s premieres first, and while initially maligned by critics, it becomes one of the most enduring works in the repertoire.

The parallel Bohème by Leoncavallo (better known for his Pagliacci) opens. It shares the same title, characters, and major plot points with Puccini’s opera, but the composer’s libretto focuses the drama on Marcello and Musetta rather than Rodolfo and Mimì.

Amadeo Vives’s Bohemios, a one-act zarzuela (Spanish operetta) only loosely based on Murger’s stories, premieres. It follows a pair of bohemians, Roberto and Víctor, as they attempt to get their opera produced.

Lillian Gish stars as Mimì in a silent-film version of La bohème. Though counterintuitive, opera was a common source for scripts in pre-sound cinema.

The New York Shakespeare Festival produces an English-language, Broadway-style adaptation of Puccini’s opera, featuring Linda Ronstadt as Mimì.

Baz Luhrmann’s enormously popular 1990 staging for Opera Australia moves to Broadway in 2002. Elements of the Bohème narrative also make their way into Luhrmann’s 2001 movie-musical Moulin Rouge! starring Nicole Kidman.

Exactly a century after the premiere of Puccini’s Bohème, Jonathan Larson’s rock opera Rent opens on Broadway. The musical updates the story to Manhattan’s East Village during the AIDS epidemic.

The Cape Town-based Isango Ensemble creates a Xhosha-language version of Bohème set in present-day South Africa, where tuberculosis rates are still high. It was adapted into the 2015 film Breathe Umphefumlo.