Better on the Big Screen: Wayne Gooding reflects on the role of technology in the Met’s new ‘Rheingold’

Review of Das Rheingold, directed Lepage, conducted Levine, New York Met, 2010.

March 2011, Volume 5, Number 1, 82–7.

This is a tale of two performances of the Metropolitan Opera’s new production of Das Rheingold: one experienced live from the Grand Tier of the Lincoln Center theatre (30 September), the other also live, but experienced virtually, about 345 miles from the stage on a Cineplex movie screen in Toronto (9 October). I make the bald distinction at the outset because Met General Manager Peter Gelb’s drive to democratise opera-going over the past five years – with the Live in HD movie transmissions as his flagship initiative – raises certain issues about the proper boundaries for a discussion of live opera.