Crack-up at the Met

A brief but damaging episode in which Peter Gelb pressured Opera News to stop reviewing the Met — then reversed course within a day after public backlash.

Key Takeaways

• Opera News (published by the Metropolitan Opera Guild) announced it would discontinue reviews of the Met, apparently under pressure from Gelb after critic Fred Cohn panned Robert Lepage’s staging of Götterdämmerung and editor Brian Kellow followed with criticism of the current regime.
• The move triggered immediate and intense public pushback — hundreds of comments on opera blog Parterre Box, comparisons to Putin, critics calling Gelb “setting fire to the Met” and questioning if he was “losing his mind.”
• Within a day, the Met reversed the policy and announced Opera News would continue reviewing Met productions.
• Gelb’s stated regret: “I think I made a mistake.”
• Alex Ross argues the episode reveals a deeper pattern: Gelb’s extreme sensitivity to criticism and a management style that is “at once brutal and maladroit,” generating negative press despite his genuine marketing strengths.

Relevance to Met

This is foundational context for understanding Gelb’s relationship with the press. The 2012 Opera News incident is the origin point of a recurring pattern — Gelb attempting to suppress or discredit criticism rather than absorb it — that continued into 2024 (see article-met-war-on-critics-2024). For anyone at the Met thinking about communications strategy, critic relations, or the institution’s public image, this episode is a case study in how not to handle negative reviews.

Questions Raised

• Has the Met ever formally addressed what oversight mechanisms exist to prevent a general manager from pressuring the Guild’s editorial independence?
• What happened to Fred Cohn and Brian Kellow’s relationship with Opera News after this?
• Did the Met board take any action — or did they continue to give Gelb “free rein” as Ross implies?