Les brigands

Les brigands (The Bandits) is an opéra bouffe, or operetta, by Jacques Offenbach to a French libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy. Meilhac and Halévy's libretto lampoons both serious (Schiller's play set to music by Verdi) and light theatre (Fra Diavolo and Les diamants de la couronne by Auber). The plot is cheerfully amoral in its presentation of theft as a basic principle of society rather than as an aberration. As Falsacappa, the brigand chieftain, notes: "Everybody steals according to their position in society". The piece premiered in Paris in 1869 and has received periodic revivals in France and elsewhere, both in French and in translation.

Les brigands has a more substantial plot than many Offenbach operettas and integrates the songs more completely into the story. The forces of law and order are represented by the bumbling carabinieri, who always arrive too late to capture the thieves, and whose exaggerated attire delighted the Parisian audience during the premiere. In addition to policemen, financiers receive satiric treatment. The satire is a pretext for joyful musical romps and the frequent Italian and Spanish rhythms are more real than in real life; "Soyez pitoyables" is a true canon, and each act finale is a well-developed whole. A 1983 New York Times, article concluded that the music of the piece seems to have influenced Bizet in writing Carmen and noted that the librettists for this work supplied Bizet's libretto, but standard Offenbach references do not mention any such influence.

Les brigands was first performed at the Théâtre des Variétés, Paris on 10 December 1869; this version was in three acts. A four-act version was subsequently prepared for a production at the Théâtre de la Gaîté, opening on 25 December 1878. The piece achieved great success as the Second Empire came to an end. Only the outbreak of the Franco-Prussian War in the following months dampened audience enthusiasm. The work was soon popular around Europe and beyond: it was produced in Vienna, Antwerp, Prague, Stockholm, Berlin, Madrid and Budapest in 1870, and in New York City at The Grand Opera House in 1870–71.

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