Mark
Holme

Paris, 1827: Hector Berlioz has dropped out of medical school to become a great composer. The Romantic movement is sweeping across Europe, and when an English theatre troupe arrives in Paris, Shakespeare is to become its clarion call. When the leading lady is delayed, the unknown actress Harriet Smithson takes centre stage. 

     Berlioz witnesses Harriet's overnight success and, like the rest of Paris, falls madly in love with 'La Belle Irelandaise'. Harriet's rise is meteoric. She goes on tour, leaving our hero to pick up the pieces of a broken heart and try to launch a career that the establishment is all too reluctant to support.

      Caught up in a passionate affair with virtuoso pianist Camille Moke, Berlioz is determined to prove himself worthy. He enters a prestigious competition and against the explosive backdrop of the July Revolution, Berlioz completes his winning entry. At last he has the chance of both a career and of winning Camille's hand, but when forced to study in Italy as part of the prize, his worst fears are realised when she marries someone else.

      His plans for murderous revenge thwarted, when Berlioz returns to Paris, Harriet Smithson is back, but her star waning. He tries once more to win her heart. Throwing himself into his work, he creates his most enduring piece, the Symphonie Fantastique, winning the admiration of his peers and the hand of his beloved. 

        With a beating heart of passion and dramatic romance, The Romantic is also a true story.