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Cargando... The Toughest Show on Earth: My Rise and Reign at the Metropolitan Operapor Joseph Volpe
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An anecdote-filled behind-the-scenes look at more than forty years of the highlights, successes, and day-to-day inner workings--productions, divas, and backstage dramas--of New York's Metropolitan Opera House, by Joseph Volpe, the only general manager to have risen through the ranks. This book is the story of Volpe's years leading up to the Met, from his first big job as a stagehand at the Morosco Theater to the odd jobs he picked up moonlighting. It is his Met years--from apprentice carpenter to general manager--that tell about New York and the business of culture. Volpe looks at the Met today, an institution of vast egos and complicated politics, as well as its glittering past. He writes about the general managers he worked under; his own embattled rise to the top; his bad-cop, good-cop collaboration with conductor James Levine; and making a family of highly charged artist-stars and visionary directors.--From publisher description. No se han encontrado descripciones de biblioteca. |
Debates activosNingunoCubiertas populares  
 Google Books — Cargando...GénerosSistema Decimal Melvil (DDC)792.5092The arts Recreational and performing arts Stage presentations, Theatre Opera, dramatic vocal forms standard subdivisions History, geographic treatment, biography - specific theatres and companies BiographyClasificación de la Biblioteca del CongresoValoraciónPromedio: (3.7)
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The book is wildly self-serving and is Volpe’s opportunity to publicly settle more than a few scores. At times too, Volpe is somewhat self-aggrandizing, often scornful and occasionally just plain mean, but this book delivers what others only promise – lots of juicy insider dish. What also comes through is his dogged protectiveness and love for the Met.
Volpe pulls no punches and writes both lovingly and with rancor about some of the Met’s personalities. He is surprisingly brutal in his descriptions of various individuals in the Met’s management - with two major exceptions. He describes how Rudolf Bing who is Volpe's polar opposite in every way, mentored him. He also writes how Bruce Crawford, the Met’s Board President brilliantly and skillfully stewarded the Met back from near bankruptcy.
Though he's not one to dwell, he does discuss several regrets. His soured relationship with John Dexter, the director of numerous acclaimed productions in the late 1970’s and early 1980’s and his famous firing of the notoriously difficult soprano Kathleen Battle are both described and justified. He does seem a bit wistful that both relationships could not be salvaged.
He has soaring praise and respect for James Levine and he writes lovingly and protectively of Luciano Pavarotti. Pavarotti evidently could even charm Volpe, a man who seems immune to that brand of outsized charisma in other divas.
For all his bluster, the book illustrates Volpe’s fierce protectiveness and love for the institution. Toward the end, he writes:
"It’s a company in the true sense-a collective of singers, musicians, dancers, directors, designers, and backstage and front-of-the-house people of many callings. They all work at the Met because making opera is a job for the human spirit." (