(Eric Grode’s article appeared in The New York Times, 4/9; via Pam Green.)
Renée Fleming has performed at Bayreuth, La Scala and the Super Bowl. She has lent her soprano to the contents of a David Letterman Top 10 list. She has inspired a character in a best-selling novel (Ann Patchett’s “Bel Canto”) and a dessert by the chef Daniel Boulud.
What she had never done, until a few weeks ago, was leave her shoes or her lozenges at the theater overnight. “I actually have my own dressing room for the first time!” she all but squealed at a Midtown Italian restaurant. “It’s like camp!”
Unlike in the world of opera, where productions are staged in repertory with rotating stars, Ms. Fleming’s dressing room at the Longacre Theater belongs to her night after night. She’s there eight times a week — another significant adjustment — to perform in “Living on Love,” an opera-besotted new Broadway farce that opens on April 20.