The opera site that turns audience into catwalk stars
mainThe Met, desperate to appear interactive, has hired fashion photographer Rose Callahan to scour its public areas for talent and use its audience as catwalk models. The opening shots are nothing less than a Manhattan eye-opener. Do not attend the Met under-dressed (as if you ever would).
Enjoy.
This is why it’s getting more and more unbearable to go the Met. (Many of these fashion victims love to text _during_ performances).
One of the male fashion mavens appears to be sporting Early YMCA …
I had a great time at the MET 2 weeks ago until people told me that there also happened something on the stage which I must have missed.
Well done, Met, for reinforcing some of the worst prejudices against opera.
These photos show around 10 patrons each night out of 4,000! Many of them are not “fashion victims” or even over-dressed and some of the photos show very conservative outfits, all rather well photographed, which is the point. If you scoured virtually any theatre or opera house, you could easily find 1 in 400 wearing something matching or exceeding the few excesses shown in the Met photos!
It seems to me that the attacks on anyone who dresses well, let alone “up”, to go to the opera usually emanate from those who so ostentatiously dress down when they go out. Is it really so bad to dress smartly? At least those of us who do not feel the need to pretend to be impoverished students when we go out have usually managed to wash (and in the case of most males shave) if for no other reason out of courtesy to our neighbours.
“If you scoured virtually any theatre or opera house, you could easily find 1 in 400 wearing something matching or exceeding the few excesses shown in the Met photos!”
But it’s about perception, not fact. Seems to me that this is not the sort of publicity that opera needs.
Why not just relax and enjoy these fun photos?! Great to see people of all ages getting excited about a night out at the opera and feeling a desire to dress for the occasion. So what if this happens everywhere else; we’re looking at the here and now at the fabulous Met of New York and these people are enjoying themselves.
If texting is an issue, why not just address the problem with the person doing it. I’m sure they’ll comply with your wishes. Here in France I have an 80* year old lady who sits next to me and records arias at the HD productions. The green light constantly flashes when recording so I told her about this. Problem solved!