Stupid Met Tricks: Dave Does Opera

Someone please stop general manager Peter Gelb, before he turns the Metropolitan Opera into a laughingstock. Proud of yesterday’s embarrassingly lame debut on the “Late Show with David Letterman,” the Met has posted this inane backstage look at the singers’ preparations for a televised excerpt from Rossini‘s “Barber of Seville.”
We learn, to our consternation, that “Gelb, [Bartlett] Sher [the director], [Maurizio] Benini [the conductor], and other Met staffers waited in the green room, talking about Borat.” What, you thought maybe were discussing bel canto? We know that Gelb is trying to popularize opera, but this fatuousness is the wrong kind of populism.
And here’s what the singers were instructed to do by Sher, the theatrical director whom Gelb tapped to try his hand at staging this new production, which debuts at tomorrow the Met:
Pretend you’re in a rock band! A crazy rock band.
Apparently, the hapless singers’ idea of being a rock band was standing still, with wooden expressions, and singing at such a reckless pace that they were raggedly out-of-sync. It was more Gilbert and Sullivan than Rossini, and we can only hope that the performance will come off better in more familiar surroundings. The subtitles provided a hilarious subtext for what the audience must have been feeling:
If this goes on, I’ll go insane.
There’s no more reason, there’s only confusion.
The noise never ceases, it only increases.
Now I love the Met (or I did, when music director James Levine did more of the actual conducting). I can only imagine the maestro cringing in Boston, as he watched the nationally broadcast disintegration of the musical seamlessness that he had worked so hard and long to build.
And now, if you’ll excuse me: My Metropolitan Opera Shop holiday catalogue has just arrived in the mail. I’ve got to order the perfect gift for the opera lover who has everything except good taste:
Met Opera House Snow Globe: Our musical snow globe enchants with The Metropolitan Opera House and City skyline set in a swirl of snow. The rotating base is artfully carved to show the interior of the House, gold curtain and stage. 18-note music movement plays an aria from Rigoletto.
On second thought, I think I’ll stick with “Frosty the Snowman.”