Submitted by alan willig, Mar 24, 2008 12:12

I must correct your writer regarding the 1954 Salzburg production of DON GIOVANNI--it did not come to the Metropolitan (or anywhere else for that matter). The Met production of 1957 was produced by Herbert Graf and designed by Eugene Berman and remained one of the company's treasures through 1984. Though there have been good things about the two subsequent productions by Franco Zeffirelli and Marthe Keller, the Berman remains by a considerable margin the finest of the three. As for the comment that New York badly needs an alternative to the Met, I can only say that Mortier's way hardly seems to be that. Instead, the pursual of unique repertoire and controversial European producers is exactly the same philosophy Peter Gelb is bringing to the Met. As a longtime operagoer, I look forward to many of Mr. Mortier's productions, but wasn't the function of City Opera to bring opportunities to American singers, composers, and conductors? What Mr. Mortier proposes abandons the repertory system at lower prices initially begun by the City Opera founders. A return to ideas like the City Opera's season in the fifties devoted entirely to American opera would be far more to the point. As far as the standard repertory is concerned, why should there not be a house that presents CARMEN and BOHEME to operatic neophytes with fresh young voices and novel production ideas? A really innovative policy--and a real alternative to what is going on at the MET--would be for City Opera to become the English National Opera of New York, presenting its entire repertory in English. I think that would pull in crowds and bring a new and meaningful identity to City Opera.

The canard that City Opera brings in youthful, adventurous audiences is simply that--a canard. Right now, City Opera's subscription audience seems even more middle-aged and stodgy than the Met's (people will always go to hear famous singers and conductors, which is why the Met is surviving so well these days) and the last few performances I have attended at the State Theater--even for unusual works like KING ARTHUR and AGRIPPINA--have shown rows of empty seats; ironically enough, these were usually not in the orchestra locations but in in the fourth and fifth tiers, where one would expect these more "adventurous" customers to grap up the cheaper seats.

I wish Mr. Mortier the best of luck--certainly his plans whet the appetite of an experienced operagoer like myself. But as far as renewing the City Opera's profile or increasing its box-office appeal, I have my doubts. Remaking our "people's opera" into a New York version of Mr. Mortier's Paris and Salzburg seasons does not seem the way to bail out City Opera from its current artistic and financial crises.

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