BARELY two months after the restoration of La Scala was unveiled at a glittering gala, the great opera house is in chaos, with strikes threatening to bring down the curtain amid backstage intrigues worthy of an Italian libretto.

One topic dominated the gossip in Milan’s elegant cafés yesterday: the dismissal by La Scala’s board of directors of Carlo Fontana, who has been superintendent (general manager) since 1990. In his place the board named Mauro Meli, who was brought in as La Scala’s artistic director in October 2003 and has been at loggerheads with Signor Fontana ever since.

For both the fur-clad members of Milan high society and the “loggionisti” who queue for cheap seats in the gods there is no doubt who is the main actor in the drama: Riccardo Muti, La Scala’s charismatic and often imperious conductor and musical director. “You cannot have three powerful figures imposing their diktat,” said Danilo Rossi, a veteran viola player who has led protests by staff this week over the mayhem at the top.

Signor Muti has long been at odds with Signor Fontana, accusing him of “dumbing down” the repertoire by staging popular shows such as Leonard Bernstein’s West Side Story.

Two years ago Signor Muti was instrumental in bringing in Signor Meli, a former superintendent of the Cagliari opera house in Sardinia, as artistic director, “to reverse the decline at La Scala” — and to force Signor Fontana out.

But the ousting of Signor Fontana has failed to resolve the tensions. It seems, in fact, to have inflamed them.

This week strikes and demonstrations have already caused the cancellation of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades, which was due to open on Tuesday.

Phoenix from the flames

• The Teatro alla Scala was built to replace a theatre destroyed by fire in 1776
• Designed by Giuseppe Piermarini, it opened in 1778 with Salieri’s L’Europa Riconosciuta
• In 1921 after a financial crisis, ownership passed to the city of Milan
• In 1943 it was badly damaged by Allied bombing. It reopened in May 1946
• Closed for renovation in 2002. Number of seats was increased by 216 to 2,030 — each with its own screen for the libretto in Italian, English and French
• Restoration cost €61 million (£42.7million), £7.7million over budget

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