To go a little deeper, the song Bizet stole from for his “Habanera” tune is also originally a “demimonde” fantasy.
This was originally a duet in “Habanera” style by the Spanish composer Iradier, from about 1860.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l0e3M3Ek4c
“El Arreglito” - the little arrangement, which should give you a clue as to the subtext.
I cant provide this with English subtitles, as it is not a normal part of the modern “art song” repertoire, unlike Iradiers “Paloma”.
The subject is a fellow trying a pickup line, and succeeding, in the context of the Havana, Cuba, bar scene of the mid 19th century, quite notorious in the Hispanosphere at the time. In other words, it is loaded with demimonde glamor.
As such it works superbly for, say, a setting in a San Francisco fern bar of the 1980’s. Which scene I knew very, very well.
As for its antecedents, consider Mozarts “La ci darem la mano” from “Don Giovanni” (1787). That thing is an absolute classic pickup scene. The brilliant lyricist, Da Ponte, packed absolute mountain ranges of irony and hypocrisy and lubricious subtext into that, with a handful of words that outdoes Tom Wolfe at his best.
Hoo Boy!
Bizet did a full “Claudine Gay” on that tune! LOL!