La Bohème, Royal Opera House, review: charm and lustre from Calleja and Netrebko

So now we bid farewell to another dear old friend, as John Copley’s venerable production of Puccini’s weepie, rich in period detail and devoid of interpretative tricks, is being laid to rest after four decades in service, embracing twenty-six revivals and well over two hundred sold-out performances.

To be honest, this loyal carthorse of a show does seem a trifle sclerotic nowadays. I’ve seen stagings recently that feel more youthfully raw and emotionally urgent; aspects of its “realism” look dated; and the second interval slows the pace down unhelpfully.

^{Joseph Calleja sings with Anna Netrebko (Photo: ALASTAIR MUIR)}

But the tableaux for the snowy Barrière d’Enfer and bustling Café Momus remain wonderfully atmospheric, and the straightforward characterisations never inhibit the singers. Richard Jones, rumoured to be commissioned for a replacement, will have his work cut out to provide anything sturdier.

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Copley, a spry octogenarian, returned to rehearse this final outing and made a lively job of it. Sharp cameos from Ryland Davies (Alcindoro) and Donald Maxwell (Benoit) sprinkled light relief. Marco Vinco’s Colline mourned his pawned coat in style, Lucas Meachem presented an exuberant jock of a Marcello, and Jennifer Rowley was a brassy Musetta, with a touch of Ethel Merman about her gusto.

But was it really necessary to import the adequate but unremarkable Simone del Savio for the purely supporting role of Schaunard? Or come to that, the Israeli conductor Dan Ettinger, whose boisterous conducting was nothing special either?

Never mind, we had come to hear the two leads, and on the whole they delivered. As Rodolfo, Joseph Calleja certainly redeemed himself after the flop of Un Ballo in Maschera last Christmas, even though he seemed nervous above the stave and didn’t fill the expansive phrases of ‘Che gelida mannina’ with enough ease.

Like his fellow Bohemians, he looked rather too portly and prosperous to be starving in a garret, but his great charm as both singer and performer won out - the dappled sunlit tone he generates is always a pleasure to hear.

His Mimi was the mercurial Anna Netrebko, in lustrous voice. She is not a subtle artist, and having adjusted her focus to more dramatic repertory, her resinous soprano can’t convey the fragility of the consumptive flower-girl. She also failed to float the rapturous “ball of light” note at the end of Act I.

But she never just phones it in or holds back à la Gheorghiu, and here she gave of herself unstintingly, most notably in an affecting account of the third act - one of Puccini’s most masterly inspirations.

Box office 020 7304 4000, www.roh.org.uk; Until 16 July