A 6-Hour Opera in a Pandemic? The Met Goes for It.

As some try to lure audiences back with short programs, the Metropolitan Opera is staging its longest work: Wagner’s “Die Meistersinger.”

As cultural institutions come back to life this fall after the long pandemic shutdown, many are trying to lure audiences back with shorter shows, often free of intermissions.

The Metropolitan Opera is taking a different tack.

In an audacious bit of counterprogramming, the Met is currently staging the longest opera in its repertory, Wagner’s nearly six-hour “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg.” Even in prepandemic times the work was a herculean undertaking, requiring an army of more than 400 artists and stagehands, breakneck set changes, spirited fight scenes and two 40-minute intermissions.