We're not sayin' there's a connection between these two events, mind you. We report.
1 - La Scala's legal counsel requires Opera Chic to change her logo and to remove a bunch of pictures taken inside the theatre from her blog. She bravely caves in.
A few days later,
2 - Milan's Mayor cuts the city's funding to La Scala; and Riccardo Muti, as a guest of the MiTo Festival (really cool roster: Ian Bostridge, Yuri Temirkanov, Riccardo Chailly, Fabio Luisi, Gianandrea Noseda, Hèlène Grimaud, Kent Nagano, George Pehlivanian, Maxim Vengerov, Charles Dutoit and many others, full program in .pdf here) will conduct in nearby Turin the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in September but has refused to conduct at la Scala, letting it be known -- thru art critic and Culture Secretary of Milan's city govt Vittorio Sgarbi quoted in today's Repubblica, story not online -- that "he'll be back when Donna Elvira does not appear on la Scala's stage riding a moped" (last year's Don Giovanni, directed by Peter Mussbach, famously featured a scene where Donna Elvira joyrides on a vintage Lambretta moped: we'd show you the photo but then we'd hear from la Scala's lawyers again, no thx bi, we'll wait until Berlin's Staatsoper makes those images available to all bloggers, not only to the bloggers they like).
Milan mayor Letizia Moratti explained that la Scala "receives 6.3 million euros a year and another 1 to 3 million euros from the central government in Rome". Some of those city funds will be instead given to other smaller theatres and orchestras. Not to la Scala. "We have 33 institutions that receive a total sum of 300,000 euros; Pomeriggi Musicali receives 250,000 euros, Orchestra Verdi 300,000. The lack of balance is self evident".
What does it mean?
It means: All that government cash? Some of it ain't coming next year!
Since the possibility of downsizing the already-bloated personnel of la Scala (four times as large as the Metropolitan Opera's, according to Italian newspaper Il Foglio) is not going to happen (ditto for the upper echelon of the opera house reducing their own salaries), OC fears that the already expensive Scala tickets will. Just. Cost. More.
vvvvvvv HUGE ARTICLE UPDATE vvvvvvvv
Here's the round-up from the Italian news:
Il Giornale Below:
Il Giornale Below:
Corierre della Sera Below:
La Repubblica Below:
