(Credit: OLGA RUBIO-DALMAU)

In response to the Metropolitan Opera’s General Manager Peter Gelb’s attacks on Anna Netrebko, the soprano’s lawyer has submitted a revised supplemental complaint in her lawsuit in a New York federal court.

In the complaint, Netrebko’s lawyer alleges that the Met and Peter Gelb defamed and disparaged her in retaliation for asserting her rights.

The compaint further alleges that the Met and Gelb inflicted further harm on Netrebko’s career by publicly dissuading other opera companies from employing the soprano. The complaint further notes that the Met and Gelb acted with common law malice.

Alongside the complaint, Netrebko’s lawyer Julie Ulmet filed a letter to Judge Analisa Torres, stating that Netrebko “seeks the Court’s leave to file a supplemental complaint in order to defend herself from their [Peter Gelb] ongoing attacks and harassment.”

Among the attacks that Netrebko has received from Gelb are a claim he made in Ukraine in which he said the soprano had “certain conversations with the Kremlin.” Ulmet’s adds, This is “a brand new assertion which Gelb is alleged to have recently fabricated.”

The letter also notes that several “cease and desist letters” were sent, but “Defendants still have not relented in their smear campaign against her.”

In the supplemental complaint and demand for a jury trial, Netrebko’s team noted that Gelb was aware of the soprano’s statements against the war on Feb. 26, 2022, and March 1, 2022, but continued to state that she did not condemn the war until her Met contracts were terminated on March 3, 2022.

According to the filing, Gelb was unhappy with the soprano’s statements in which she said she was “opposed to this senseless war of aggression and was “calling on Russia to end this war right now.” Gelb responded to her then-manager Judith Neuhoff, of Centre Stage Arts Management, by text message, noting “that it was not sufficient and she needed to specifically ‘call upon Putin’ to end the war.

It also revealed that after Netrebko’s March 1  statement, Gelb told Neuhoff by email that he “appreciated her [Netrebko’s] most recent message denouncing the war.” The court document also noted that Gelb reviewed Netrebko’s March 1 public statement and indicated that he understood the statement to “express that Netrebko was opposed to the war, telling Neuhoff by text message that it was not sufficient because ‘it needs to be clear to the public that not only is Anna against the war, but that she is against the person who is waging it.'”

According to documents, Netrebko also expressed fear for Putin, but Gelb criticized the soprano’s fear and told Neuhoff, “she should be scared of the harm to her professional reputation instead of being scared of Putin.”

The court document also alleges that Gelb was aware of Netrebko’s anti-war sentiments because, in early March 2022, “he acknowledged to colleagues by email that prior to her firing, she had ‘posted [an] anti-war statement.'”

Netrebko’s Manager, Miguel Esteban, also released a statement noting, “Today, Anna Netrebko has revised her draft supplemental complaint in her lawsuit in New York federal court against the Metropolitan Opera and Peter Gelb, alleging new claims of defamation. Shortly before Judge Torres issued her decision last month to reinstate a cause of action that had previously been dismissed (national origin discrimination), Anna Netrebko had submitted a request to file a supplemental complaint raising new allegations of defamation by defendant Peter Gelb made during a recent media blitz in Ukraine and Austria. The draft complaint demonstrated why the defamatory statements were retaliatory in nature, posed a threat to Anna Netrebko’s safety, and served to dissuade other employees of the Metropolitan Opera from acting against the institution.”

He added, “At the Court’s invitation, Anna Netrebko has revised her proposed supplemental complaint to clarify how the new defamation claims are different from those that the Court dismissed by showing that they were made with actual malice. While Anna Netrebko has the right to appeal the decision regarding the original cause of action for defamation after the current proceeding runs its course, she believes this supplemental complaint will make evident that the defendants knowingly and repeatedly made defamatory statements to willingly inflict reputational harm on her and to potentially incite others to endanger her.”

OperaWire has reached out to Neuhoff regarding the cited text messages between her and Peter Gelb. At the moment of publication there has been no response. If there is one, OperaWire will provide a follow up and revise this article accordingly.