Here's the pitch

First the Met brought live performances to movie theaters around the world. Now -- here's a cool thought -- what if Cincinnati Opera had a live simulcast in Great American Ball Park of an opera playing in Music Hall?

That's what San Francisco Opera and the SF Giants are doing in the City by the Bay this September, with a production of Saint-Saens' epic opera "Samson and Delilah."

The show, starring Russian mezzo Olga Borodina and tenor Clifton Forbis (and incidentally, directed by former Cincinnatian Sandra Bernhard) will be transmitted through state-of-the-art techno wizardry direct from the War Memorial Opera House to AT&T Park.

Baseball -- and opera -- fans can attend for free, with seating on the field and in the stands. (All that's required is a ticket to enter the ballpark.)

So where will they show the opera? On the stadium's Mitsubishi Electric Diamond Vision scoreboard.

Free live simulcasts are among the innovations of David Gockley, the new opera general director. The company will have a free live simulcast of Mozart's "Don Giovanni" on June 22 in three venues -- Cal Berkeley, UC Davis and Wells Fargo Center for the Arts in Santa Rosa.

Think people will come? In October, a simulcast of "Rigoletto" drew 14,000 to Civic Center Plaza in SF and Frost Amphitheatre at Stanford.

Sounds like a home run to me!