L'attaque du moulin


L'attaque du moulin is a drame lyrique in four acts by the French composer Alfred Bruneau. The libretto, by Louis Gallet with the collaboration of Émile Zola, is based on a short story by Zola. Zola's story is about the Franco-Prussian War, but the setting of the opera was changed to the period of the French Revolution.

Performance history

L'attaque du moulin was first performed on 23 November 1893 by the Opéra-Comique at the former Théâtre Lyrique on the Place du Châtelet in Paris. The mise-en-scène was by Léon Carvalho, the scenery by Marcel Jambon, and the costumes by Théophile Thomas. The original production was performed a total of 39 times.
The Gaîté Lyrique revived the opera on 16 December 1907, and the Opéra-Comique, on 25 March 1922. By 1917 the opera had been presented outside France in eleven different cities, including Brussels, London, Breslau, Geneva, Milan, The Hague, Barcelona, New York, New Orleans, Vienna, Birmingham, and again London.

Roles