‘La Bohème’ in space returns to Paris, 6 years after uproar

By RONALD BLUM
Associated Press

Claus Guth’s controversial staging of Puccini’s “La Bohème,” set on a spaceship and a planet’s barren surface, returns to the Paris Opéra six years after an audience uproar at its premiere caused conductor Gustavo Dudamel to momentarily stop the show. Guth imagines the drama unfolding across an unspecified future, perhaps 50 years from now or possibly 1,000. Set designer Étienne Pluss takes inspiration Stanley Kubrick’s “2001: A Space Odyssey” and created a doomed spaceship on a raked stage for the first two acts and a bleak planet for the final two. There are 12 performances through June 4.