When is The Nutcracker not The Nutcracker? When's it's mashed together with Tchaikovsky's Iolanta to represent the blind princess’ inner world in a dark interpretation.
In his whole career as an opera composer Puccini only wrote one pure comedy, Gianni Schicchi, and even that forms part of his trilogy Il Trittico, of which the other parts could hardly be more tragic. However, La bohème is also a comedy in its own way, a comedy cut short by tragedy.
