Under water
Rusalka and her sisters are huddled in the flooded basement.
Questo e Quello
Immortal beloved
Janácek’s Makropulos Case has only chalked up thirteen performances in three previous runs at the Met and will have just five more this season. Try to catch at least one.
When Divas Collide II: Mad Men Edition
To kick off this week’s intermission feature, cher public, La Cieca invites you to imagine who said what to whom to make two legendary ladies laugh so lustily?
Screen and screen again
The New York Times sends cub reporter (Get it? Cub reporter! Oh, La Cieca is killing herself with the puns!) Zachary Woolfe to the movie palaces of the heartland.
A shot in the dark
Which diva, oblivious to the open mikes of the theater PA system, recently fired off this immortal line at her impresario: “You run this place like the Gestapo!”
Don’t drop the Regie
Our most recent Regie quiz yielded lots of guesses from the cher public, many of them very clever indeed.
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth
“The Met’s new Ring is the most frustrating opera production I have ever had to grapple with.”
ENO is enough
The repertory for the upcoming season of the English National Opera (also known as “Peter Gelb‘s shopping list”) boasts the world premiere of a new opera by Philip Glass, The Perfect American, which imagines the last days of Walt Disney.
Hier bleibt Elektra
The Met has finally released the contents of the James Levine 40th Anniversary box sets separately for those of us who didn’t have $500 lying around.
L’Âge d’Or
A friend of the box just reminded La Cieca that tonight, April 22, 2012 is the 40th anniversary of the farewell gala honoring Sir Rudolf Bing.
Eye rolling
It turns out we were wrong all along, cher public: the Robert Lepage production of the Ring at the Met is in fact a triumph.
Demimonde
La Cieca has just had the news confirmed that Natalie Dessay canceled after Act 1 of La Traviata earlier this evening at the Met.
Intermission feature
Has the week really gone by so quickly?
Bringing up baby
La Cieca hears that Diana Damrau has withdrawn from the Royal Opera’s production of Robert le Diable (due to open December 6) because of pregnancy.
Comeback kid
After an absence of seven seasons, tenor Richard Leech will return to the stage of the Met on April 27 as Albert Gregor in The Makropulos Case.
Red all over
You’ve heard what it sounded like; now you can see Saturday afternoon’s HD of La traviata, thanks to YouTube.
NYCO 2012-2013 season announcement
Coverage starts live, here on parterre, at 11:00 AM.
News! News! News! News! News! News! News!
The acclaimed Théâtre du Châtelet production of Nixon in China will, unlike the revolution, be televised.
The sorrowful précis
Brian Kellow‘s “Coda” piece in the current Opera News, summarized: “I’m so cranky that even namedropping has lost its thrill.” (Photo: Ken Howard/Metropolitan Opera)
Glücklich zu sehen, je suis enchanté!
Tenor Nikolai Schukoff (recently Parsifal in the Lyon production) displays so much furry semi-nudity on his web site that the page should be called “Otter Space.”
Ass backwards
Zachary Woolfe went to Las Vegas and all we got was a thoughtful analysis of why Robert Lepage was never a good fit for the Ring.
Gold standard
Like everyone else, La Cieca was watching Mad Men last night, and suddenly something clicked.
Once on this regie
This busy production stumped just about everyone.
I’ll take the fall
The days are getting shorter, but you can keep the prattle going this fall’s Talk of the Town! You will, you can, you must join in the discussion about: Great mezzo soprano performances (October),
Gained in translation (November), Teleport me back to… (December).