After canceling “Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg at the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Paul Curievici is organizing a GoFund Me for legal costs to fight the company.

In the campaign, Curievici wrote, “The Teatro Maggio Fiorentino planned and contracted a cast for Wagner’s opera ‘Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg’ – 17 principal singers – for performances this summer. The theatre canceled the production one month before rehearsals, replacing it with a revival of Verdi’s ‘Falstaff,’ and then unilaterally withdrew from the ‘Meistersinger’ contracts, claiming its financial position left it no choice.”

The campaign added, “The theatre had a choice. It could have rehired as many of our cast as possible for ‘Falstaff.’ It could have performed ‘Meistersinger’ as a concert without the expensive production. It could even have tried to renegotiate our contracts. Instead, it chose to leave 13 of the contracted singers unpaid, unemployed, uncompensated.”

The campaign was created after 13 singers threatened legal action against the company earlier in June.

The Maggio Musicale cut the production of Wagner’s work after the resignation of Alexander Pereira, former superintendent of Florence’s Maggio Musicale who is being investigated for fraud. The company is also attempting to recover an 8.5 million euro deficit by July 2023 and has thus far canceled productions of “Così fan Tutti” and “Le nozze di Figaro” in the autumn.