Leading opera singers took to social media to express their outrage following the cancellation of the scheduled run of Carmen at the Théâtre de la Monnaie/De Munt, Belgium’s leading opera house in Brussels. The cancellation, just days before opening night, was forced after Belgium’s government brought in strict rules surrounding public gatherings with the rapid spread of Covid’s Omicron variant. The new rules would have reduced La Monnaie’s seating capacity from 1,200 a night to a mere 200. A spokesman for the opera company said that the restrictions would result in a box-office loss of €900,000: ‘We would only be able to sell 2,400 tickets instead of the planned 13,800, and it becomes clear that such a scenario would not meet everyone’s expectations.’
The production of Carmen staged by Dmitri…
