Speaking of Broadway, David Merrick once said (if La Cieca recalls correctly) that even though Pearl Bailey played Hello, Dolly! for only one season, the legendary diva managed to squeeze in two seasons’ worth of cancellations. A roughly similar situation may be observed at Opera Orchestra of New York, a company that does only three performances a year and yet manages to rack up as many cast changes as Lyric Opera of Chicago.

According to La Cieca’s generally very reliable source, the latest bit of OONY reshuffling will reunite the leading ladies of New York City Opera’s recent Vanessa. The Rienzi cast continues to include Lauren Flanigan (wasted on the all-singing no-acting role of Irene), joined now by erstwhile Erika Katherine Goeldner.  La Cieca is told that Eva Urbanová examined the role of Adriano but decided it was too low. (Or possibly she has more interesting things to do back in her homeland!)

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La Flanigan will hover near the Medea production as well, though Barbara Quintiliani is the official cover for Aprile Millo. Flanigan is the “secret” cover, or La Cieca supposes she should say was the “secret” cover since, well, it’s not exactly a secret now, is it?

And nobody cares about The Tsar’s Bride anyway.