FLEMING I keep saying that to my colleagues! The first preview, I said, “Well, [in opera] we would have opened by now, all the critics would be here tonight.” Another thing that shocked me is the rehearsal process. There’s a huge number of people in rehearsal, and evidently when we start running the show there’ll be hardly anybody backstage. Whereas at the Met it’s the opposite.

O’HARA Right! That was one of the biggest things here [at the Met] during “Merry Widow,” arriving in a dressing room that wasn’t my home. On Broadway you make it your home, because you’re there so much: You decorate, you bring your things from home, you put your pictures out. No one comes to that door. You walk yourself to the stage and you stand alone. You don’t want to be touched. And you wait, and you prepare, and you focus.

Here, I remember getting my makeup. Knock-knock-knock. “I want to introduce you to …” or “We have this person here. …” Finally the show’s going to start. I’m a little frazzled. Then it’s “Kelli O’Hara to the stage.” They walk me to the stage. Then it’s a person standing behind me saying, “Go!” It’s so huge, there are about a gazillion stagehands and about 17 stage managers.

What’s it like, coming from here to a Broadway-size theater, and trying to adjust to Rodgers and Hammerstein?

FLEMING For opera, we are the amplification. So the body amplifies the voice, with this kind of projection, and also breath pressure and support. And in music theater, it’s the opposite. You really want the microphone to do that work of amplification, so you save yourself. You just couldn’t do it eight shows a week.

O’HARA I don’t think that I’ve ever adjusted my singing much [for microphones]. But I still try to sing with all of my body, and they adjust the mic down if they need to for me.