[Dixielandjazz] Simulcasting and OKOM?

[Steve Barbone]

If it works for Opera,(which also suffers for lack of interest, maybe it
would work for OKOM? Perhaps festivals like the Jubilee could be simulcast
throughout the USA and the less successful festivals could die peacefully?

Cheers,
Steve (tongue firmly in cheek) Barbone


Met Opera to Expand Simulcasts in Theaters

NY TIMES - By DANIEL J. WAKIN - May 17, 2007

He is no Spider-Man, but Papageno held his own at the movies this season.

The Metropolitan Opera says its simulcasting of operas into theaters, which
has sent ripples through the opera world, was so successful over the last
five months that it will expand the program next season.

Peter Gelb, the company¹s general manager, said he expects the number of
people who attend live Met performances in movie houses next season to match
the cumulative audience for all 225 performances in the Met auditorium:
about 800,000 people. Mr. Gelb also said he expects the series to make a
profit, a word not often heard in the opera world.

He ascribed other benefits to the simulcasts this season. They increased
attendance, although there is no hard evidence for this; brought excitement
to the performers and other company members; and served as a powerful
marketing tool, he said in an interview this week.

³This is considered by any standards to be a great success,² Mr. Gelb said
of the simulcast series. ³There was considerable skepticism about whether
this would work.²

This season the Met simulcast six operas live to movie theaters across the
United States, Canada and a handful of other countries and added repeats
(³Encores,² in its marketing language). For the first live show, ³The Magic
Flute² on Dec. 30, about 21,000 people watched in front of 98 screens. For
the last, ³Il Trittico² on April 28, 48,000 people watched in front of 248
screens. 

In all, the Met sold 324,000 tickets worldwide at $18 each in the United
States and more overseas, taking 50 percent of the proceeds and earning at
least $3 million, as well as additional income from the sale of rights. Each
simulcast cost $850,000 to $1 million to make. The Met had to use about $1
million in endowment money to make up the costs, but Mr. Gelb said that next
year expanded showings and the sales of rights and DVDs should mean that the
program will at least pay for itself, with a surplus likely.

By contrast ³Spider-Man 3² played in 4,252 theaters last weekend, has taken
in total receipts of at least $247 million domestically, and with the
average ticket price of $6.55, that makes 37.7 million tickets sold.

Next year the Met hopes to double the number of theaters for each broadcast;
increase the number of simulcast productions to eight; expand its foreign
coverage, now including Germany, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Britain and Japan,
possibly to France, Italy, Belgium, Austria and Spain; and offer
pay-per-view showings for a month after the live event.

The simulcasts certainly have the attention of other opera companies. Last
month in Miami they were all the buzz at the annual conference of Opera
America, a service organization for companies, said Marc A. Scorca, its
president.

³There was a lot of wonderment about whether the transmissions will be the
21st-century equivalent to the radio broadcasts that began in the 1930s,²
Mr. Scorca said. Opera managers also talked about whether theater
transmissions will galvanize enthusiasm for opera and complement the
performances of resident companies, he said.

While there was no evidence that the Met broadcasts have hurt ticket or
subscription sales at local companies, Mr. Scorca added, some opera managers
wondered whether they eventually would.

A half-dozen opera officials interviewed said they saw no potential negative
effect on how productions might be cast or conceived when directors ‹ and
singers ‹ knew they would be shown on a big screen.

³I do not now cast for the movies, nor do I ever intend to,² said Speight
Jenkins, the general director of the Seattle Opera. Mr. Jenkins praised the
simulcasts, which appeared in towns outside Seattle, as a way of exposing
more people to the art form, but like other officials he stressed that the
best opera experience was a live one.

Already one company has followed the Met¹s lead. The Washington National
Opera said last week that it would simulcast two productions next year, but
to college campuses, with tickets free.

Local opera companies have used the Met broadcasts to try to drum up
interest in their own performances. They have left brochures on cars in
movie-house parking lots, set up information tables in theater lobbies and
sent representatives to address the audiences, Mr. Scorca said. In a sign
that the cultures of moviegoing and opera attending don¹t mix, several
theater operators barred such efforts, he added.

Foreign opera houses have also expressed interest in making their own
transmissions. 

The Royal Opera House at Covent Garden in London is negotiating with several
theater chains and its unions to provide simulcasts, said the company¹s
chief executive, Tony Hall.

³All of this is about reaching a larger audience and proving that opera has
lots of things to say to people today,² he said.

Nicolas Joël, the director-designate of the Opéra de Paris, called opera
simulcasting ³a very exciting development,² adding, ³It¹s certainly a way of
bringing new audiences to our theater.²

Mr. Joël said he planned to talk to the house¹s unions to make such
transmissions possible. ³I told my friend Peter Gelb I wouldn¹t let the Met
be the only broadcast in France.²