Les Misrables (play /le? 'm?z?r??b/ or /le? ?m?z?'r??b/; French pronunciation: ?[ le mize'?abl?

]), colloquially known as Les Mis or Les Miz /le? 'm?z/, is a sung-through musical play based on the nove l of the same name by French poet and playwright Victor Hugo. It has music by Claude-Michel Schnberg, original Fre nch lyrics by Alain Boublil and Jean-Marc Natel, with an English-language libretto by Herbert Kretzmer. Set in e arly 19th-century France, it is the story of Jean Valjean, a burly French peasant of abnormal strength and pote ntially violent nature, and his never ending quest for redemption after serving 20 years in jail for having sto len a loaf of bread for starving relatives. Valjean decides to break his parole and start his life anew after a k indly Bishop inspires him to, but he is relentlessly tracked down by a police inspector named Javert. Along the way, Valjean and a slew of characters he becomes entangled with get swept into a revolutionary period in France, wher e a group of young idealists make their last stand at a street barricade. The musical adaptation was originally conceived and produced in France, before i ts English language adaptation, which opened at the Barbican Centre in London, England, on 8 October 1985, where the production overcame bad notices through word of mouth, launching the beginning of what has turned ou t to be a global sensation.