Ahead of curtain-up, English National Opera heralded Benedict Andrews’s production of Puccini’s La bohème as “a brilliant new interpretation”. Never mind that it’s usually the audience who decide whether something is “brilliant”. That tone of desperation tolled a warning bell. La bohème requires fine singing, excellent acting, subtlety and nuance amid the banter and tragedy, expert orchestral playing and an emotionally imaginative drive to a heartbreaking end. It reveals new shards of genius on each hearing. From its exuberant opening flourish, this masterpiece holds you in its grip. If you challenged me at gunpoint to sit through this opera without shedding a tear, I’d have to say “OK, just shoot me”.

The unthinkable has happened: a dry-eyed Bohème in which the end came not a moment too soon. Cliche followed embarrassing cliche. Another syringe, another ligature, another attempt to make the lives of human beings “modern” or “relevant”. When ever was a young woman’s death from lingering disease not relevant? Nothing felt right from the start of this co-production with Dutch National Opera, already seen in Amsterdam.

Mimi is, unusually, on stage from the outset, peering into the bohemians’ apartment through a door, letting her hair down in silhouette as if in readiness for her supposedly chance encounter with the poet Rodolfo. He waits for his friends to go out before shooting up. Evidently that’s what she wants too. This turns their instant love – given credibility against the odds by Puccini in the way the score builds unerringly to the climactic O soave fanciulla – into drug-induced fumbling.

The Paris garret, in Johannes Schütz’s attractive designs, is now an airy, ground-level apartment, open-plan with huge, double-height windows, the kind of place a bunch of trendy young architects, or any of us, come to that, might like if it was cleaned up a bit with a few replica Eames chairs scattered around. The magic of Christmas Eve at Cafe Momus in Act 2 is sapped by placing it in a drab high-street shopping mall, which revolves incoherently, turning Puccini’s scrupulous, taut writing into dismal chaos. The usually explosive and sexy exchange between Musetta (Rhian Lois) and Marcello (Duncan Rock) ends up, despite their best efforts, a damp squib.

At least Alcindoro (the ever reliable Simon Butteriss) is reassuringly creepy. The long-awaited spring in Acts 3 and 4 is more like summer – men in short sleeves, trees in bloom, children playing outside the sickroom window until, eventually, only one girl is left alone on a swing. Heavily symbolic of the brevity of youth, no doubt, but a distraction. Instead of sharing Rodolfo’s grief as Mimi lies dying, you start wondering who’ll be first to drop the ball in their game of catch.

American soprano Corinne Winters was an attractive Mimi, vocally secure but never, on first night, exploring the full colours of Puccini’s music. Ashley Riches as Schaunard and Nicholas Masters as Colline had good moments. As Musetta, Lois is full of promise both as singer and actor, but seemed unsure how to characterise the role. It was not her fault. The American tenor Zach Borichevsky looked tremendous but sounded uneasy. He and Winters were so far apart on that sustained final note of Act I, it’s a wonder the conductor, Xian Zhang, let them hang on in agony for so long. Under her baton, the orchestra played with some style, but the pace felt stilted, with awkward pauses for uncertain applause. As the anguished final chords rang out announcing Mimi’s death and Rodolfo’s grief, this great work suddenly broke free and tugged at the heart, too late.

Francesca Zambello’s 2006 staging of Carmen – the one with quadrupeds, acrobats, impressively glittering crowd scenes and curved walls like Richard Serra maquettes – is back at the Royal Opera House for its fifth revival. I appreciate it more now than in the past, not least for its competence, clarity and strong chorus work. Zambello knows how to move people around a stage (I’d add animals too, but never has a live horse, or donkey, looked more like a Madame Tussauds hire-in), and the final scene, in its sudden switch from public spectacle to private tragedy, is powerfully handled.

Conductor Bertrand de Billy set off at a cracking pace, which resulted in some lapses of ensemble. This wasn’t the best of casts, but had its strengths. The Russian mezzo Elena Maximova, russet-voiced and absolutely secure in technique, convinces in the title role, but lacks that final electrifying power you hope for but rarely get in a Carmen. Bryan Hymel as Don José can do anything vocally – lyrical in the first two acts, ever more urgent and searing in Acts 3 and 4 as he reels towards his fate. His high notes are precise and compelling. He makes a glorious sound, though his acting remains stolid. Jonas Kaufmann and Yonghoon Lee take over the role in later performances. Alexander Vinogradov makes an engaging, dark-toned Escamillo, as long as you’ll pardon his French – true of most of the singers, especially in the leaden-paced spoken dialogue. The show-stealing performance came from Nicole Car’s Micaëla, sweet, muscular and affecting. She’s back at the Royal Opera House in December as Tatyana in the revival of Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin. She may steal that show as well.

Star ratings (out of 5)
La bohème **
Carmen ***

• La bohème is at the Coliseum, London until 19 November. Carmen is at the Royal Opera House, London until 30 November