previously
La Cieca thanks a particularly loyal member of the cher public for pointing out the most recent bit of hard-hitting arts coverage in the Wall Street Journal, as copied and pasted by that hardest of all arts hitters, Terry Teachout. La Cieca says “copied and pasted” because in this piece Teachout manages to blather on for over 800 words without introducing a shred of new reporting or even a sliver of fresh observation.
For those of you who have not been paying any attention at all to what’s been happening at the New York City Opera since, oh, around the time the last woolly mammoth died out in these parts, La Cieca takes the liberty of emulating the Teachout’s reporting technique and pasting here a few choice snippets:
New York’s second-biggest opera company is closing up shop — temporarily. Lincoln Center’s New York State Theater, home of the New York City Opera, will be undergoing major renovations throughout City Opera’s 2008-09 season. The company had originally planned to present a series of concert opera performances in various locations around the city, then decided to trim costs by cutting back. . . .
. . .the repertoire will consist of six 20th-century operas. No Handel, no Mozart, no Puccini — just [list of operas]. All of these works are widely admired, but none has ever been mistaken for a box-office draw.
Gérard Mortier . . . has said that New York needs “a new vision in opera,” and his first season definitely fills the bill. . . .
. . . the State Theater [was] built with dance, not opera, in mind. Among other things, the house was designed in such a way as to deaden the sound of dancing feet — the opposite of what should happen in an opera house, where the goal is to make the singers on stage more audible, not less. . . .
In Europe [Mortier] has long been identified with ultratrendy, government-subsidized updates of familiar operas, most notoriously a “Fledermaus” in which Johann Strauss’s lovable characters snorted cocaine and got beaten up by Nazis. . .
. . the Metropolitan Opera, City Opera’s neighbor at Lincoln Center, has changed its once-stodgy theatrical ways. Under Joe Volpe, the Met offered a steady diet of blandly staged warhorses spiced up with an occasional dash of Eurotrash. But Peter Gelb, his successor, is bringing in stage-savvy directors like John Doyle and Bartlett Sher. . .
. . . . Mr. Mortier may be remembered as the man who turned out the lights at the New York City Opera — for keeps.
As La Cieca’s tipster comments, “How resourceful of him to publish a piece that summarizes the previous 267 articles already written on the subject without a single new insight. So very saving of labor.”
“Einstein on the Beach” could certainly be “mistaken for a box-office draw.” It sold out its New York premiere performances at the Met in 1976, and then it sold out 12 performances at BAM in 1984. I believe it did similarly well at its revival in 1992. If anything’s for certain about the 2009-10 season, it’s that “Einstein” will sell out again.
Of course, that doesn’t mean that Mortier is going to make any money off the opera. After the 1976 performances, Glass was deep in debt and had to go back to driving a cab.
SanderO :
“Lincoln Center is and embarrassment and
should have been torn down right after it was built”
I believe it was the film critic Penelope
Gilliat who said that Lincoln Center looked like it
had been ordered on the phone by Mussolini.
Droneon (a/k/a Teachout) DOES know what century he’s living in: Gertrude Himmelfarb’s imaginary 19th century, when gays and lesbians kept out of sight and there was none of this nonsense about racial equality.
No Handel?! Hallelujah!
Mortier = The Sun
Teachout = a dim lightbulb
I thought it was, by far, the best commentary yet written on the subject. Far better than the puff piece that Tommassini keeps writing about NYCO and Mortier which rarely, if ever, goes below the surface and addresses any real issues.
Of course, some “can’t handle the truth” as Mr. Nicholson would say.
Boo hoo.
Anyone who thinks that “Einstein on the Beach” is a box office draw is living in a bubble somewhere. It sold out 20 performances in 32 years and that makes it a “box office draw?”
Please. When it sells out year after year like a Boheme or Aida or Carmen then it will be a box office draw.
Methinks some people here don’t even know the correct usage of certain terms. Is this who Mortier is programming for?
Lights out, indeed.
No one seems to even recognize the biggest problem with this stagione system. It leaves out anyone who doesn’t live in New York City.
How many of NYCO subscribers and patrons come from all over the world? Will people come to NYC 10-12 separate times during the year to see ONE production?
This is so short-sighted it isn’t even funny and yet I have yet to see it addressed anywhere in the media.
Lights out indeed.
I agree with Mark…obviously the TIMES and Tony T. have the pom-poms out for Mortier…it’s nice that SOMEONE else is calling it like it is.
Terry Gross is a woman.
Terry Teachout is a man.
Terry cloth is what my sweatbands were made of, which I used to wear while aerobicizing to Olivia Newton-John’s “Physical.” (Those sweatbands were often peeled off and hurled across the room during the “animal” verse.)
And that’s how I keep all three Terry’s “straight”.