La Périchole

The title character is a poor Peruvian street singer whose love for Piquillo becomes entangled with the whims of the Viceroy Don Andrés. Their attempt to stay together drives the disguises, forced marriage, imprisonment, and comic reversals of the opera.

The libretto by Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy is loosely based on Prosper Mérimée's 1828 play Le Carrosse du Saint-Sacrement. Offenbach transforms that source into an opéra bouffe with songs, satire, and exaggerated political comedy.

The opera premiered at the Théâtre des Variétés in Paris in 1868. It is structured in three acts and uses music by Jacques Offenbach with a French libretto.

Its plot uses comic misunderstandings, social satire, theatrical disguises, and deliberately exaggerated authority figures. Numbers such as Ah! quel dîner je viens de faire show how Offenbach combines catchy vocal writing with farce.