NYC’s Met Opera filling multiplex theaters in US

posted by HowardBHaas on January 25, 2008 at 7:50 am

Even in its home town of New York City, the Met Opera is selling many tickets for multiplex broadcasts on large movie screens.

It’s all part of a marketing strategy by Met general manager Peter Gelb to attract a new, younger audience.

“We’re creating, basically, satellite opera houses,” Gelb said. “But the Met offers something you don’t get at a performance — cameras that show action behind the scenes and interviews in dressing rooms, the equivalent of going into the locker room of a sports team.”

On a recent weekend, ticket sales for the Met broadcasts reached $1.65 million, pushing Charles Gounod’s “Romeo and Juliet” to No. 11 in North American movie box-office receipts, according to Variety.

Read the full story in theSun Times.