The very first words in this issue are “Renata Scotto will return to the American operatic stage in the 2001 season!”
Tell us: What was the best of 2025?
Parterre Box concludes the thrilling first year of Talk of the Town by inviting your lightning rod opinions on several more categories of operatic argumentation.
“Oh yes, and there were seven naked men on the ground around her.”
What other company indeed but the Bayerische Staatsoper would commission David LaChapelle to photograph Diana Damrau for their portrait gallery?
Promiscuous — it’s not a pretty word. But when a matron in black underwear cavorts with two dozen naked hunks, what else can you call her?
A parterre reader just back from the matinee of Powder Her Face relates this story of two elderly ladies seated in the second row…
Now it seems the NYCO’s Duchess of Argyll will have to make do with a mere 25 lovers in the company’s production of Powder Her Face—instead of the originally planned 88.
“Greek Fire…. will see [Eva] Mendes playing the role of famed opera singer Maria Callas, but don’t expect her to be doing any arias, or even lip-synching for that matter. Instead, the biographical drama will focus on Callas’ scandalous affair with shipping magnate Aristotle Onassis.” [Toronto Sun]
Which tenor, who’s notorious for his off-the-chain antics, recently gave his colleagues the willies when he sauntered about backstage butt-naked?
“Why is the needlessly naked executioner so coy about showing us his wobbly bits?” [The Telegraph]
