AP News, December 7th, 2007
The New York City Opera may lose its home at the State Theater for the 2008-09 season to allow for reconstruction, then return to the Lincoln Center venue for the start of Gerard Mortier's regime.
Susan Baker, City Opera's chairman, said a decision probably will be made in January.
The opera shares the State Theater with the City Ballet. The opera and ballet companies agreed last month on modifications to the hall and are awaiting reports from consultants that would determine the timetable for construction.
"There was always the possibility that we would have to be dark for some or all of the '08-09 season," Baker said Thursday. "We're only part of the way through the process, which we're going to try to move along as soon as possible."
She said the opera's board will discuss the matter when it meets next week but probably would not make a decision then.
"At the moment, our thinking is that if we have to be dark in the State Theater for part of the '08-09 performance season, what we would do is have some nontraditional season in other venues," she said.
Baker said the company could perform in churches and various auditoriums around New York. She said the focus could be a lookahead to Mortier's first season, which will stress 20th century works.
Mortier, currently director of the strike-plagued Paris Opera, was hired by City Opera in February to be its general manager and artistic director starting in 2009-10. He comes with a reputation for promoting the avant-garde, an image he cemented as head of Austria's Salzburg Festival in the 1990s.
Among the works he said he plans for his first season in New York are Britten's "Death in Venice," Philip Glass' "Einstein on the Beach," Janacek's "The Makropulos Case," Adams' "Nixon in China," Debussy's "Pelleas et Melisande," Stravinsky's "The Rake's Progress," Weill's "Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny" and Messiaen's "Saint Francois d'Assise." The work by Messiaen is to be presented at the Seventh Regiment Armory on Park Avenue.
"We probably would be making a mistake if we didn't use a portion of that '08-'09 season no matter where it is to show what's to come," Baker said. "We want to be forward looking."
The possibility of City Opera skipping a State Theater season was mentioned this week in the opera blog, parterre.com.
___
On the Net:
New York City Opera: http://www.nycopera.com
