La Bohème Live at The Drive-In – ENO, East Car Park, Alexandra Palace
Monty Python used to say, and now for something completely different, and ne’er was a truer word said than with ENO director P.J. Harris’ contemporary English language adaptation of Puccini’s classic opera, and it is also transformed from its 19th C Parisian location to a modern-day encampment in a disused London car park, where we meet our four struggling hipsters: poet Rodolfo (David Butt Philip); painter Marcello (Roderick Williams); philosopher cum photographer Colline (William Thomas); and musician Schaunard (Benson Wilson), who arrives having had some good fortune. They are interrupted by Benoît (Trevor Eliot Bowes), a security guard, but cleverly trick him to avoid paying him his dues.
Whilst the others leave, Rodolfo remains but is interrupted by a young lady needing a light for...