The Met: We can’t get in to work, but we expect you tonight at the opera
mainStatement from the Metropolitan Opera:
WEATHER UPDATE: Tonight’s performance of La Traviata will go ahead as planned. The Met’s Customer Care Department is closed today due to the severe weather conditions. If you are unable to attend this evening’s performance of La Traviata due to the inclement weather, please feel free to contact us beginning tomorrow, Wednesday, March 15, and we will be happy to assist with ticketing you for a future performance, subject to availability, during the season.
Please be aware that we anticipate heavy call volumes tomorrow, so if you have difficulties reaching us, you can call at any time up to April 30, 2017, to secure your performance. Our phone hours are Monday through Saturday, from 10am to 8pm, and Sunday, from noon to 6pm, at 212-362-6000. Thank you.
Apparently NYC wasn’t as hard hit as anticipated. Probably not a pleasant ride into town, but not impossible Maybe New Yorkers closer to the scene can weigh in.
https://nyti.ms/2niXngN
This actually makes more sense than it might seem. Most people – excluding of course police, fire, sanitation, hospital staff – got the day off today. Looking out the window in late afternoon, I see sparse traffic and virtually no pedestrians. Schools and offices are closed as is the Metropolitan Museum for example. The track of the storm drifted so there is less snow here than predicted but still a lot of wind. And the closure decisions were made yesterday.
There will be ice this evening when what is on the ground freezes. I have heard that Broadway shows will be performed tonight so it is not a surprise that the MET would also. And the MET is going to accommodate those who don’t choose to go out in very inclement weather — probably a sizable portion of those who bought tickets.
There’s a lot less snow than anticipated (3-4 inches or so), but there’s a layer of now-frozen slush underneath it. And snow (very powdery) is still coming down. The underground sections of the subway have been running all day; the above-ground sections (much of the outer boroughs) have been closed, though I think they’re expected to open again around 6 pm.
I suspect that if a less-popular opera (with an emptier house) had been scheduled tonight, the Met would have cancelled. but with a production as good, and as popular, as this run of Traviata is, and with weather conditions seeming to clear up, it probably makes sense for them to go ahead.
(And I wouldn’t be surprised if they make a bunch of cheap rush tickets available to people who come from within the city, to fill the seats of people from the burbs or out of town who don’t make it.)
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Actually, while I was typing this comment, snow started to fall considerably more heavily. Go figure.
There is currently four inches of snow in Central Park, and it is raining.
Central Park now has just over 7 inches of snow. occasional flurries continue. many theaters are offering steep discounts for tonight’s performances.
I don’t understand (yet again) how the headline relates to the article.
It relates to the relentless bashing the MET undeservedly gets.
…but not to the content of the article. That makes sense. Thanks for explaining.
Well, here is how I can weigh in. I live ‘across the river’ from the MET (in New Jersey)
Trains were running on weekend schedule, which means I would not have a train going home even if I took a train into the city. Buses were not running
My friend who lives in one of the city boroughs, but not in MAnhattan, could not get to the theater, either because she takes the above-the-ground subway which was shut down. Buses in the city were not running, either.
So neither of us could make it.
The MET management forgets that not all their patrons live in Manhattan.