60 Minutes (1968) s46e05 Episode Script
Season 46, Episode 5
! When Chris Stevens was killed in Benghazi, Libya, on the anniversary of September 11th last year, it was only the sixth time that the United States had lost an ambassador to its enemies.
The events of that night have been overshadowed by misinformation, confusion and intense partisanship.
But for those who lived through it, there's nothing confusing about what happened, and they share a sense of profound frustration because they say they saw it coming.
Tonight, you will hear for the first time from a security officer who witnessed the attack.
He calls himself, Morgan Jones, a pseudonym he's using for his own safety.
A former British soldier, he's been helping to keep U.
S.
diplomats and military leaders safe for the last decade.
On a night he describes as sheer hell, Morgan Jones snuck into a Benghazi hospital that was under the control of al Qaeda terrorists, desperate to find out if one of his close friends from the U.
S.
Special Mission was the American he'd been told was there.
Morgan Jones: I was dreading seeing who it was, you know? It didn't take long to get to the room.
And I could see in through the glass.
And I didn't even have to go into the room to see who it was.
I knew who it was immediately.
Lara Logan: Who was it? Morgan Jones: It was the ambassador, dead.
Yeah, shocking.
Morgan Jones said he'd never felt so angry in his life.
Only hours earlier, Amb.
Chris Stevens had sought him out, concerned about the security at the U.
S.
Special Mission Compound where Morgan was in charge of the Libyan guard force.
Now, the ambassador was dead and the U.
S.
compound was engulfed in flames and overrun by dozens of heavily armed fighters.
Although the attack began here, the more organized assault unfolded about a mile across the city at a top secret CIA facility known as the Annex.
It lasted more than seven hours and took four American lives.
Contrary to the White House's public statements, which were still being made a full week later, it's now well established that the Americans were attacked by al Qaeda in a well-planned assault.
Five months before that night, Morgan Jones first arrived in Benghazi, in eastern Libya about 400 miles from the capital, Tripoli.
He thought this would be an easy assignment compared to Afghanistan and Iraq.
But on his first drive through Benghazi, he noticed the black flags of al Qaeda flying openly in the streets and he grew concerned about the guard forces as soon as he pulled up to the U.
S.
compound.
Morgan Jones: There was nobody there that we could see.
And then we realized they were all inside drinking tea, laughing and joking.
Lara Logan: What did you think? Morgan Jones: Instantly I thought we're going to have to get rid of all these guys.
Morgan Jones' job was training the unarmed guards who manned the compound's gates.
A second Libyan force -- an armed militia hired by the State Department -- was supposed to defend the compound in the event of an attack.
Morgan had nothing to do with the militia, but they worried him so much, he could not keep quiet.
Morgan Jones: I was saying, "These guys are no good.
You need to-- you need to get 'em out of here.
" Lara Logan: You also kept saying, "If this place is attacked these guys are not going to stand and fight?" Morgan Jones: Yeah.
I used to say it all the time.
Yeah, in the end I got quite bored of hearing my own voice saying it.
Andy Wood: We had one option: "Leave Benghazi or you will be killed.
" Green Beret Commander, Lieutenant Colonel Andy Wood, was one of the top American security officials in Libya.
Based in Tripoli, he met with Amb.
Stevens every day.
The last time he went to Benghazi was in June, just three months before the attack.
While he was there, al Qaeda tried to assassinate the British ambassador.
Wood says, to him, it came as no surprise because al Qaeda -- using a familiar tactic -- had stated their intent in an online posting, saying they would attack the Red Cross, the British and then the Americans in Benghazi.
Lara Logan: And you watched as they-- Andy Wood: As they did each one of those.
Lara Logan: --attacked the Red Cross and the British mission.
And the only ones left-- Andy Wood: Were us.
They made good on two out of the three promises.
It was a matter of time till they captured the third one.
Lara Logan: And Washington was aware of that? Andy Wood: They knew we monitored it.
We included that in our reports to both State Department and DOD.
Andy Wood told us he raised his concerns directly with Amb.
Stevens three months before the U.
S.
compound was overrun.
Andy Wood: I made it known in a country team meeting, "You are gonna get attacked.
You are gonna get attacked in Benghazi.
It's gonna happen.
You need to change your security profile.
" Lara Logan: Shut down-- Andy Wood: Shut down-- Lara Logan: --the special mission-- Andy Wood: --"Shut down operations.
Move out temporarily.
Ch-- or change locations within the city.
Do something to break up the profile because you are being targeted.
They are-- they are-- they are watching you.
The attack cycle is such that they're in the final planning stages.
" Lara Logan: Wait a minute, you said, "They're in the final planning stages of an attack on the American mission in Benghazi"? Andy Wood: It was apparent to me that that was the case.
Reading, reading all these other, ah, attacks that were occurring, I could see what they were staging up to, it was, it was obvious.
We have learned the U.
S.
already knew that this man, senior al Qaeda leader Abu Anas al-Libi was in Libya, tasked by the head of al Qaeda to establish a clandestine terrorist network inside the country.
Al-Libi was already wanted for his role in bombing two U.
S.
embassies in Africa.
Greg Hicks: It was a frightening piece of information.
Lara Logan: Because it meant what? Greg Hicks: It raised the stakes, changed the game.
Greg Hicks, who testified before Congress earlier this year, was Amb.
Stevens' deputy based in Tripoli - a 22-year veteran of the Foreign Service with an impeccable reputation.
Lara Logan: And in that environment you were asking for more security assets and you were not getting them? Greg Hicks: That's right.
Lara Logan: Did you fight that? Greg Hicks: I was in the process of trying to frame a third request but it was not allowed to go forward.
Lara Logan: So why didn't you get the help that you needed and that you asked for? Greg Hicks: I really, really don't know.
I in fact would like to know that, the answer to that question.
In the months prior to the attack, Amb.
Stevens approved a series of detailed cables to Washington, specifically mentioning, among other things, "the al Qaeda flag has been spotted several times flying over government buildings".
When the attack began on the evening of September who was back in Tripoli.
Greg Hicks: Ambassador said that the consulate's under attack.
And then the line cut.
Lara Logan: Do you remember the sound of his voice? Greg Hicks: Oh yeah, it's indelibly imprinted on my mind.
Lara Logan: How did he sound? Greg Hicks: He sounded frightened.
In Benghazi, Morgan Jones, who was at his apartment about 15 minutes away, got a frantic call from one of his Libyan guards.
Morgan Jones: I could hear gunshots.
And I-- and he said, "There's-- there's men coming into the mission.
" His voice, he was, he was scared, you could tell he was really scared and he was running, I could tell he was running.
His first thought was for his American friends, the State Department agents who were pinned down inside the compound, and he couldn't believe it when one of them answered his phone.
Morgan Jones: I said, "What's going on?" He said, "We're getting attacked.
" And I said, "How many?" And he said, "They're all over the compound.
" And I felt shocked, I didn't know what to say.
And-- I said, "Well, just keep fighting.
I'm on my way.
" Morgan's guards told him the armed Libyan militia that was supposed to defend the compound had fled, just as Morgan had predicted.
His guards -- unarmed and terrified -- sounded the alarm, but they were instantly overwhelmed by the attackers.
Morgan Jones: They said, "We're here to kill Americans, not Libyans," so they'd give them a good beating, pistol whip them, beat them with their rifles and let them go.
Lara Logan: We're here to kill Americans.
Morgan Jones: That's what they said, yeah.
Lara Logan: Not Libyans.
Morgan Jones: Yeah.
About 30 minutes into the attack, a quick reaction force from the CIA Annex ignored orders to wait and raced to the compound, at times running and shooting their way through the streets just to get there.
Inside the compound, they repelled a force of as many as 60 armed terrorists and managed to save five American lives and recover the body of Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith.
They were forced to fight their way out before they could find the ambassador.
Not long afterwards, Morgan Jones scaled the still overrun with al Qaeda fighters.
Morgan Jones: One guy saw me.
He just shouted.
I couldn't believe that he'd seen me 'cause it was so dark.
He started walking towards me.
Lara Logan: And as he was coming closer? Morgan Jones: As I got closer, I just hit him with the butt of the rifle in the face.
Lara Logan: And? Morgan Jones: Oh, he went down, yeah.
Lara Logan: He dropped? Morgan Jones: Yeah, like-- like a stone.
Lara Logan: With his face smashed in? Morgan Jones: Yeah.
Lara Logan: And no one saw you do it? Morgan Jones: No.
Lara Logan: Or heard it? Morgan Jones: No, there was too much noise.
The same force that had gone to the compound was now defending the CIA Annex.
Hours later, they were joined by a small team of Americans from Tripoli.
From defensive positions on these rooftops, the Americans fought back a professional enemy.
In a final wave of intense fighting just after 5 a.
m.
, the attackers unleashed a barrage of mortars.
Three of them slammed into this roof, killing former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty.
Lara Logan: They hit that roof three times.
Andy Wood: They, they hit those roofs three times.
Lara Logan: In the dark.
Andy Wood: Yea, that's getting the basketball through the hoop over your shoulder.
Lara Logan: What does it take to pull off an attack like that? Andy Wood: Coordination, planning, training, experienced personnel.
They practice those things.
They knew what they were doing.
That was a-- that was a well-executed attack.
We have learned there were two Delta Force operators who fought at the Annex and they've since been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross and the Navy Cross -- two of the military's highest honors.
The Americans who rushed to help that night went without asking for permission and the lingering question is why no larger military response ever crossed the border into Libya -- something Greg Hicks realized wasn't going to happen just an hour into the attack.
Lara Logan: You have this conversation with the defense attache.
You ask him what military assets are on their way.
And he says-- Greg Hicks: Effectively, they're not.
And I-- for a moment, I just felt lost.
I just couldn't believe the answer.
And then I made the call to the Annex chief, and I told him, "Listen, you've gotta tell those guys there may not be any help coming.
" Lara Logan: That's a tough thing to understand.
Why? Greg Hicks: It just is.
We--, for us, for the people that go out onto the edge, to represent our country, we believe that if we get in trouble, they're coming to get us.
That our back is covered.
To hear that it's not, it's a terrible, terrible experience.
The U.
S.
government today acknowledges the Americans at the U.
S.
compound in Benghazi were not adequately protected.
And says those who carried out the attack are still being hunted down.
Just a few weeks ago, Abu Anas al-Libi was captured for his role in the Africa bombings and the U.
S.
is still investigating what part he may have played in Benghazi.
We've learned that this man, Sufian bin Qumu, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee and long-time al Qaeda operative, was one of the lead planners along with Faraj al-Chalabi, whose ties to Osama bin Laden go back more than 15 years.
He's believed to have carried documents from the compound to the head of al Qaeda in Pakistan.
The morning after the attack, Morgan Jones went back to the compound one last time to document the scene.
He took these photos which he gave to the FBI and has published in a book he has written.
After all this time, he told us he's still haunted by a conversation he had with Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, a week before the attack.
Morgan Jones: Yeah, he was worried.
He wasn't happy with the security.
Lara Logan: And you didn't tell him all your worries? Morgan Jones: No.
No, didn't want to-- Lara Logan: Why not? Morgan Jones: I didn't want to worry him anymore, you know? He's a nice guy.
I sort of promised him he'd be OK.
Lara Logan: You think about that? Morgan Jones: Every day, yeah.
The U.
S.
pulled out of Benghazi and al Qaeda has grown in power across Libya.
When a member of our team went to the U.
S.
compound earlier this month, he found remnants of the Americans' final frantic moments still scattered on the ground.
Among them Amb.
Stevens' official schedule for Sept.
12, 2012, a day he didn't live to see.
There may be no period that so dramatically redefined the world of U.
S.
intelligence than the decade following the September 11th attacks.
Through those tumultuous years, there was one man who was in the room for almost every important decision.
Mike Morell was deputy director of the CIA and gave us the only television interview he's ever done.
He spoke to us, largely because he believes the very nature of the spy business keeps successes in the shadows, but often pushes failure into the bright lights.
Morell operated in those shadows, but his insights have helped shape the key foreign policy decisions of the last three presidents.
The first thing we asked Morell about was the last thing he did at the CIA: taking part in the damage assessment on Edward Snowden, the NSA contractor who leaked classified documents about America's secret electronic surveillance programs.
Mike Morell: I do not believe he was a whistleblower.
I do not believe he is a hero.
I think he has betrayed his country.
John Miller: How serious a hit is that to national security? Mike Morell: I think this is the most serious leak-- the most serious compromise of classified information in the history of the U.
S.
intelligence community.
John Miller: Because of the amount of it? Or the type? Mike Morell: The amount and the type.
But of the hundreds of pages of NSA documents that Snowden has leaked, Morell pointed to one in particular that has caused a great deal of damage to U.
S.
intelligence.
It's a copy of the top secret document the CIA calls its "Black Budget.
" John Miller: What value would that have to an adversary? Mike Morell: The real damage-- of leaking that document was that certainly they could focus their counterintelligence efforts on those places where we're being successful.
And not have to worry as much about those places where we're not being successful.
John Miller: Kind of like handing over the playbook to the other team? Mike Morell: Uh-huh.
(affirm) John Miller: He went first to Hong Kong and then to Russia.
Do you think that China and Russia now have access to all or much off that material? Mike Morell: I think we have to assume that any material that Mr.
Snowden had with him has been compromised.
Protecting secrets is so engrained in the CIA culture that cell phones aren't even allowed in the building.
Meetings are held in lead-lined rooms called Secure Compartmented Intelligence Facilities, or SCIFS, and if there is one room where they discuss the most closely guarded secrets of all it is the CIA director's conference room.
Mike Morell: On an average day, you know, we're making hundreds of decisions-- a good number of them in this room.
And they range across the entirety of the national security issues that this country faces.
Mike Morell joined the CIA in 1980 as an energy policy analyst.
A self-described nerd, he wanted adventure, and he would soon find plenty of it, as he rose through the ranks and became the key intelligence briefer for President George W.
Bush.
Morell traveled with the president wherever he went and was with him at a Florida elementary school on September 11th, 2001.
Mike Morell: And what I'm actually standing there thinking is, "I wonder how long we're gonna be here," because everybody knows the president was going to be at this school on this date.
And, "Is somebody going to fly a plane into this place?" Morell would travel back to Washington with the president.
He was busy reviewing early intelligence the CIA had collected, when he was told to look out the window of Air Force One.
Mike Morell: And what you could see was an F-15 on the wing tip.
You could see the pilot's face.
And in the background, you could see the still burning Pentagon.
And that is a memory I'll never forget.
The CIA launched a plan to dismantle al Qaeda and even today, the single most controversial piece of that strategy was the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques.
" John Miller: Let me read you a list of some of the techniques that were used by the CIA to get information: waterboarding, hitting, bouncing suspects off walls, confining them in small spaces, loud music, sleep deprivation, nudity, keeping suspects in physical stress positions.
If these were Americans being held overseas by a foreign power, would we have called that torture? Mike Morell: I actually, John, want to challenge you on the word torture.
My officers carried out the guidance that was provided to them-- in both administrations, and obviously that was differing guidance.
What's my view? My view was that those coercive techniques were the wrong thing to do.
My view was that those techniques were inconsistent with American values.
And-- for that reason-- I don't think they should have been done.
No top CIA official has ever said that before.
In Morell's 33 years in the CIA, perhaps the boldest change in how the agency achieved results came literally out of the blue: armed drones in the skies over Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen became the go-to weapon to kill al Qaeda terrorist.
But the UN and others have said they have also caused hundreds of civilian fatalities.
Mike Morell: This is a very precise weapon.
Collateral damage is very low.
It's not zero, I wish it was.
But it is as close to zero as we have gotten with any weapons system in the history of this country.
There is no doubt in my mind that without these operations, that there would have been another attack in the homeland that would have rivaled the scale of 9/11.
To pave the way for military and intelligence operations including the use of drones, the CIA has reportedly supplied between $50 and $100 million over the past decade, in direct cash payoffs to President Karzai.
John Miller: Foreign aid is one thing, but cash in suitcases and backpacks to the president and key aides has a different feel to it? Mike Morell: It's all foreign assistance to the government of Afghanistan.
John Miller: Is there a quid pro quo here about you take care of me, and I'll allow unfettered drone operations in the country even though they're unpopular? Mike Morell: I think that those things that President Karzai allows the United States of America to do in Afghanistan are in the interests of Afghanistan.
The CIA has paid in cash, but also in blood during the war in Afghanistan.
At the agency's headquarters stars are etched into the marble marking the number of CIA officers killed throughout the Agency's history.
A ledger contains a list of names, but some remain classified.
John Miller: When I look here, I see Forward Operating Base Chapman, probably if not the worst, one of the worst, days for losses in CIA history.
Mike Morell: Absolutely.
December 2009.
We lost seven officers.
It happened at this base in the Khost province of Afghanistan.
A team of CIA officers waited for this man, Humam al-Balawi.
Mike Morell: Somebody that we hoped to be an asset of ours in this fight had essentially double-crossed us and detonated a suicide vest.
This was the first time that a CIA asset killed his case officer.
But while the attack in Khost was the biggest loss of life for the CIA since the start of the Afghan war, the biggest loss of credibility came with the intelligence that led to the invasion of Iraq.
Mike Morell: I think that my biggest mistake was not in scrubbing that analysis more closely.
I wish I would have done that.
After Iraq, CIA analysts were required to not just analyze the intelligence, but also give an assessment of their level of confidence in what the agency's spies were reporting.
Mike Morell: And so what we really learned from that experience was that analysts need to think about their confidence level and to be very, very clear with policy makers about it.
John Miller: That would happen today? Mike Morell: That would happen today.
John Miller: As a matter of discipline? Mike Morell: As a matter of course.
As a matter of discipline, as a matter of the trade craft of doing intelligence analysis.
And that Morell says was a key factor when the analysts were asked how sure they were Osama bin Laden would be found hiding in this compound in Abbottabad.
Mike Morell: The lead analyst put the number at 95 percent.
The collective group of analysts put that number at 80 percent.
Mike Morell: When I said 60 the president asked me, "Do you think we should do this?" And I said, "Absolutely" because I thought it was the best chance we ever had and might be the best chance we would have for a long, long time.
This photo, taken in the White House Situation Room on the night of the raid, was seen everywhere, but the operation was actually being run at CIA headquarters, inside this room.
Mike Morell: Place was packed with people.
Computers everywhere, video conferencing with folks in Afghanistan, the White House, folks at the Pentagon.
And just an awful lot of activity when the director and I walked in.
A picture captures the moment when Mike Morell and then CIA Director Leon Panetta heard the news: bin Laden had been killed.
Mike Morell: And that's when they said, "Geronimo, for God and country, Geronimo.
" And the director and I gave each other a hug at that point.
It wasn't a hug of happiness that bin Laden had been killed.
It was a hug of, "This is over.
This piece of this story is over.
" Today, bin Laden's gun which was never fired on the night of the raid, as well as the scale model of bin Laden's compound are on display at CIA Headquarters, and as Mike Morell finishes a career of 33 years assessing the strength and weaknesses of nations.
He believes America can manage most external threats, but as an analyst he sees our greatest vulnerability is one generated right here at home.
Mike Morell: What really keeps me up at night is the inability of our government to make decisions that will push our economy and our society forward.
And one of the things I learned looking at the world is that a country's national security, any country's national security is more dependent on the strength of its economy and on the strength of its society than anything else.
I think there is for some reason that I don't understand, John, there's been a change from a willingness of the two parties to work together to get things done to today, the two parties at each other's throat and simply trying to score political points.
And I don't know why that's occurred.
And I-- and I don't have a good understanding of how to fix that.
But that's what needs to be fixed.
The phrase "the greatest show on Earth" usually refers to the circus but a man named Peter Gelb, who runs the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, is doing everything he can to change that.
He is reinventing opera, making it accessible to more people -- even those who always thought they would hate it.
Gelb wants opera to become as popular and populist as it was a hundred years ago.
He believes people would come out in droves for opera if they just had a chance to see it.
There's no other place where you can see such monumental staging, elaborate sets and a cast of hundreds.
And raw emotion, beautiful women -- defiant and doomed -- and special effects that you might expect to find in a Hollywood movie.
But it's not just about the magic.
The Met is above all about extraordinary voices -- some of the very best voices in the world.
Beginning with rehearsals, we followed a new production, a reimagining of Giuseppe Verdi's masterpiece Rigoletto.
Polish tenor Piotr Beczala belts out one of Verdi's greatest hits.
Bob Simon: What's the difference between singing at the Met and singing in the smaller European houses? Piotr Beczala: It's the most important opera house in the world.
Bob Simon: Do you get more nervous before Met performance than at other performances? Piotr Beczala: Maybe a little.
Maybe a little because I know how important it is here.
Serbian baritone Zeljko Lucic sings the role of Rigoletto.
Zeljko Lucic: This is the-- kind of crown of our business, coming to New York and Metropolitan.
Because I know what kind of people, what singers sang here and stood at the same place where I am.
Bob Simon: In fact, when you sing the first time at the Met, is it a very big deal? Zeljko Lucic: Yes because that's your chance to prove yourself.
And if you are, you know, if you-- how-- how can I say, blew it out? Bob Simon: If you blow it? Zeljko Lucic: If you blow it, you're done.
That's it.
Unlike divas of the past German soprano Diana Damrau is a working mom, nursing a two-month-old baby and a cold.
She has a lot to contend with.
Bob Simon: You were quite sick last week? Diana Damrau: Yes.
I'm still a bit.
But I tried not to sing all the time, and reduce a little bit.
Bob Simon: Just a little bit, I mean-- you were belting it out.
Diana Damrau: Oh, no, only at the end.
Rigoletto is far from the only thing going on here today.
There can be as many as 10 operas in production at once.
Right now, the Met stage is being set up for a new version of Richard Wagner's Parsifal, a sacred opera that's never been done like this before.
Dozens of raven-haired maidens sloshing around in a river of blood -- 1,600 gallons of the stuff -- heated so the singers don't get cold.
Overseeing all this is that worried looking man, Peter Gelb, the Met's general manager.
He says opera is a blood sport.
Peter Gelb: I go in every day to the Met knowing that this is-- there is a battle to be waged and fought for the survival of this art form.
And so I'm here to do that.
Bob Simon: This is your seventh year at the Met.
Peter Gelb: Yes.
Still here.
Seven years micro-managing one of the biggest theaters in the world and one of the most expensive to run.
The Met employs over 3,000 people.
It spends more than a million dollars a day on its productions.
Peter Gelb: We are the closest thing to an opera factory that one could possibly imagine, except the difference is-- is that all of our factory workers are the greatest artists in the world.
[Stagehands: Right now.
We got it.
Singers: Wahoo!.]
Peter Gelb: We're doing seven performances a week.
Constantly going from opera to opera which is why our stage is busier than any other opera house in the world.
It's like a giant self-sufficient ocean liner.
But that liner was in danger of sinking when Gelb took over in 2006.
It was awash in debt with falling attendance and an audience which might not be around much longer.
Peter Gelb: It was way behind the times.
And it had become so mired in images of elitism that unless that changed, unless it was prepared to become accessible-- as opera once had been-- it was going to be very difficult for the Met to survive.
To make opera more accessible, Gelb opened up dress rehearsals to the public for free and put up huge screens in Lincoln Center and Times Square.
And he did something which has never been done before.
He began transmitting live performances in HD to movie theaters around the world, now in 64 countries.
Those broadcasts are money-makers - this year they grossed nearly $60 million, more than three-quarters of total tickets sold.
Peter Gelb: There's no opera company in the world today that has a global audience that the Met has because of these live HD transmissions.
Bob Simon: But you're still a hundred million dollars in debt.
How does that relate to everything you've done? Peter Gelb: Opera's always in debt from a business point of view, opera shouldn't exist.
I mean, it only exists because there are enough people who love opera and my job is to try to persuade them that it is necessary to change in order to keep the art form alive.
Otherwise it will die with them.
One of Gelb's strategies to keep opera alive is to update the classics, like Rigoletto.
After four weeks of rehearsals it's opening night.
Rigoletto has been performed over 800 times here but this audience, almost 4,000 here and another 350,000 watching in HD as far away as Tokyo, is about to see a radically different version -- 10 minutes before curtain, you can cut the tension with an A-flat.
Piotr Beczala: OK.
I'm ready.
Zeljko Lucic: It seems that I'm not nervous.
But--yea of course I am.
This is a big thing.
So I'm kind of, you know, cooking somewhere here-- you have this feeling that everything's-- that you are going to throw up.
[Stage manager: Gilda to stage right.
Ms.
Damrau to stage right.
Stage manager: Maestro to the pit, please.
Maestro to the orchestra pit please.
.]
Giuseppe Verdi set his tale of debauchery, lust, and vengeance in a corrupt court in its modern equivalent: Las Vegas in the 1960s.
The heartthrob, the duke, is now a big shot singer and casino owner with an eye for the ladies.
and those have been revamped too.
[Countess: Take it easy fella.
Duke: My hearts on fire.
Countess: Cool it, mister! Duke: You hooked me, baby.
.]
It's a big role of the dice for Peter Gelb.
Will the old guard be ready for show girls, a pole dancer? Even a sharp dressed hit man? His name is Sparafucileone of the longest names in opera.
Bob Simon: When you decided to put on Rigoletto in Las Vegas, what worried you the most? Peter Gelb: That I was heading for a disaster, but it's a risk worth taking.
The risk of doing nothing is the greatest risk of all.
In the last act the mood changes.
Rigoletto will not have a happy ending, very few operas do.
[Diana Damrau: Let's go and die.
Zeljko Lucic: Yea, but peacefully.
.]
The plot is much too complicated to explain but we'll just tell you Rigoletto's daughter sacrifices herself to save the duke.
It will be a spectacular death scene with the Met pulling out all its stops.
From the chorus back stage, to the lighting team, to the HD crew sending it out live around the world.
The hit man offs the daughter and stuffs her into the trunk of a 1960 Cadillac Coupe Deville.
She breathes her last in her father's arms.
At the final curtain the audience jumps to its feet, even the orchestra applauds.
That doesn't happen every day.
For Gelb, it was a good night.
But in opera, as in so many other things, you're only as good as your next night.
The events of that night have been overshadowed by misinformation, confusion and intense partisanship.
But for those who lived through it, there's nothing confusing about what happened, and they share a sense of profound frustration because they say they saw it coming.
Tonight, you will hear for the first time from a security officer who witnessed the attack.
He calls himself, Morgan Jones, a pseudonym he's using for his own safety.
A former British soldier, he's been helping to keep U.
S.
diplomats and military leaders safe for the last decade.
On a night he describes as sheer hell, Morgan Jones snuck into a Benghazi hospital that was under the control of al Qaeda terrorists, desperate to find out if one of his close friends from the U.
S.
Special Mission was the American he'd been told was there.
Morgan Jones: I was dreading seeing who it was, you know? It didn't take long to get to the room.
And I could see in through the glass.
And I didn't even have to go into the room to see who it was.
I knew who it was immediately.
Lara Logan: Who was it? Morgan Jones: It was the ambassador, dead.
Yeah, shocking.
Morgan Jones said he'd never felt so angry in his life.
Only hours earlier, Amb.
Chris Stevens had sought him out, concerned about the security at the U.
S.
Special Mission Compound where Morgan was in charge of the Libyan guard force.
Now, the ambassador was dead and the U.
S.
compound was engulfed in flames and overrun by dozens of heavily armed fighters.
Although the attack began here, the more organized assault unfolded about a mile across the city at a top secret CIA facility known as the Annex.
It lasted more than seven hours and took four American lives.
Contrary to the White House's public statements, which were still being made a full week later, it's now well established that the Americans were attacked by al Qaeda in a well-planned assault.
Five months before that night, Morgan Jones first arrived in Benghazi, in eastern Libya about 400 miles from the capital, Tripoli.
He thought this would be an easy assignment compared to Afghanistan and Iraq.
But on his first drive through Benghazi, he noticed the black flags of al Qaeda flying openly in the streets and he grew concerned about the guard forces as soon as he pulled up to the U.
S.
compound.
Morgan Jones: There was nobody there that we could see.
And then we realized they were all inside drinking tea, laughing and joking.
Lara Logan: What did you think? Morgan Jones: Instantly I thought we're going to have to get rid of all these guys.
Morgan Jones' job was training the unarmed guards who manned the compound's gates.
A second Libyan force -- an armed militia hired by the State Department -- was supposed to defend the compound in the event of an attack.
Morgan had nothing to do with the militia, but they worried him so much, he could not keep quiet.
Morgan Jones: I was saying, "These guys are no good.
You need to-- you need to get 'em out of here.
" Lara Logan: You also kept saying, "If this place is attacked these guys are not going to stand and fight?" Morgan Jones: Yeah.
I used to say it all the time.
Yeah, in the end I got quite bored of hearing my own voice saying it.
Andy Wood: We had one option: "Leave Benghazi or you will be killed.
" Green Beret Commander, Lieutenant Colonel Andy Wood, was one of the top American security officials in Libya.
Based in Tripoli, he met with Amb.
Stevens every day.
The last time he went to Benghazi was in June, just three months before the attack.
While he was there, al Qaeda tried to assassinate the British ambassador.
Wood says, to him, it came as no surprise because al Qaeda -- using a familiar tactic -- had stated their intent in an online posting, saying they would attack the Red Cross, the British and then the Americans in Benghazi.
Lara Logan: And you watched as they-- Andy Wood: As they did each one of those.
Lara Logan: --attacked the Red Cross and the British mission.
And the only ones left-- Andy Wood: Were us.
They made good on two out of the three promises.
It was a matter of time till they captured the third one.
Lara Logan: And Washington was aware of that? Andy Wood: They knew we monitored it.
We included that in our reports to both State Department and DOD.
Andy Wood told us he raised his concerns directly with Amb.
Stevens three months before the U.
S.
compound was overrun.
Andy Wood: I made it known in a country team meeting, "You are gonna get attacked.
You are gonna get attacked in Benghazi.
It's gonna happen.
You need to change your security profile.
" Lara Logan: Shut down-- Andy Wood: Shut down-- Lara Logan: --the special mission-- Andy Wood: --"Shut down operations.
Move out temporarily.
Ch-- or change locations within the city.
Do something to break up the profile because you are being targeted.
They are-- they are-- they are watching you.
The attack cycle is such that they're in the final planning stages.
" Lara Logan: Wait a minute, you said, "They're in the final planning stages of an attack on the American mission in Benghazi"? Andy Wood: It was apparent to me that that was the case.
Reading, reading all these other, ah, attacks that were occurring, I could see what they were staging up to, it was, it was obvious.
We have learned the U.
S.
already knew that this man, senior al Qaeda leader Abu Anas al-Libi was in Libya, tasked by the head of al Qaeda to establish a clandestine terrorist network inside the country.
Al-Libi was already wanted for his role in bombing two U.
S.
embassies in Africa.
Greg Hicks: It was a frightening piece of information.
Lara Logan: Because it meant what? Greg Hicks: It raised the stakes, changed the game.
Greg Hicks, who testified before Congress earlier this year, was Amb.
Stevens' deputy based in Tripoli - a 22-year veteran of the Foreign Service with an impeccable reputation.
Lara Logan: And in that environment you were asking for more security assets and you were not getting them? Greg Hicks: That's right.
Lara Logan: Did you fight that? Greg Hicks: I was in the process of trying to frame a third request but it was not allowed to go forward.
Lara Logan: So why didn't you get the help that you needed and that you asked for? Greg Hicks: I really, really don't know.
I in fact would like to know that, the answer to that question.
In the months prior to the attack, Amb.
Stevens approved a series of detailed cables to Washington, specifically mentioning, among other things, "the al Qaeda flag has been spotted several times flying over government buildings".
When the attack began on the evening of September who was back in Tripoli.
Greg Hicks: Ambassador said that the consulate's under attack.
And then the line cut.
Lara Logan: Do you remember the sound of his voice? Greg Hicks: Oh yeah, it's indelibly imprinted on my mind.
Lara Logan: How did he sound? Greg Hicks: He sounded frightened.
In Benghazi, Morgan Jones, who was at his apartment about 15 minutes away, got a frantic call from one of his Libyan guards.
Morgan Jones: I could hear gunshots.
And I-- and he said, "There's-- there's men coming into the mission.
" His voice, he was, he was scared, you could tell he was really scared and he was running, I could tell he was running.
His first thought was for his American friends, the State Department agents who were pinned down inside the compound, and he couldn't believe it when one of them answered his phone.
Morgan Jones: I said, "What's going on?" He said, "We're getting attacked.
" And I said, "How many?" And he said, "They're all over the compound.
" And I felt shocked, I didn't know what to say.
And-- I said, "Well, just keep fighting.
I'm on my way.
" Morgan's guards told him the armed Libyan militia that was supposed to defend the compound had fled, just as Morgan had predicted.
His guards -- unarmed and terrified -- sounded the alarm, but they were instantly overwhelmed by the attackers.
Morgan Jones: They said, "We're here to kill Americans, not Libyans," so they'd give them a good beating, pistol whip them, beat them with their rifles and let them go.
Lara Logan: We're here to kill Americans.
Morgan Jones: That's what they said, yeah.
Lara Logan: Not Libyans.
Morgan Jones: Yeah.
About 30 minutes into the attack, a quick reaction force from the CIA Annex ignored orders to wait and raced to the compound, at times running and shooting their way through the streets just to get there.
Inside the compound, they repelled a force of as many as 60 armed terrorists and managed to save five American lives and recover the body of Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith.
They were forced to fight their way out before they could find the ambassador.
Not long afterwards, Morgan Jones scaled the still overrun with al Qaeda fighters.
Morgan Jones: One guy saw me.
He just shouted.
I couldn't believe that he'd seen me 'cause it was so dark.
He started walking towards me.
Lara Logan: And as he was coming closer? Morgan Jones: As I got closer, I just hit him with the butt of the rifle in the face.
Lara Logan: And? Morgan Jones: Oh, he went down, yeah.
Lara Logan: He dropped? Morgan Jones: Yeah, like-- like a stone.
Lara Logan: With his face smashed in? Morgan Jones: Yeah.
Lara Logan: And no one saw you do it? Morgan Jones: No.
Lara Logan: Or heard it? Morgan Jones: No, there was too much noise.
The same force that had gone to the compound was now defending the CIA Annex.
Hours later, they were joined by a small team of Americans from Tripoli.
From defensive positions on these rooftops, the Americans fought back a professional enemy.
In a final wave of intense fighting just after 5 a.
m.
, the attackers unleashed a barrage of mortars.
Three of them slammed into this roof, killing former Navy SEALs Tyrone Woods and Glen Doherty.
Lara Logan: They hit that roof three times.
Andy Wood: They, they hit those roofs three times.
Lara Logan: In the dark.
Andy Wood: Yea, that's getting the basketball through the hoop over your shoulder.
Lara Logan: What does it take to pull off an attack like that? Andy Wood: Coordination, planning, training, experienced personnel.
They practice those things.
They knew what they were doing.
That was a-- that was a well-executed attack.
We have learned there were two Delta Force operators who fought at the Annex and they've since been awarded the Distinguished Service Cross and the Navy Cross -- two of the military's highest honors.
The Americans who rushed to help that night went without asking for permission and the lingering question is why no larger military response ever crossed the border into Libya -- something Greg Hicks realized wasn't going to happen just an hour into the attack.
Lara Logan: You have this conversation with the defense attache.
You ask him what military assets are on their way.
And he says-- Greg Hicks: Effectively, they're not.
And I-- for a moment, I just felt lost.
I just couldn't believe the answer.
And then I made the call to the Annex chief, and I told him, "Listen, you've gotta tell those guys there may not be any help coming.
" Lara Logan: That's a tough thing to understand.
Why? Greg Hicks: It just is.
We--, for us, for the people that go out onto the edge, to represent our country, we believe that if we get in trouble, they're coming to get us.
That our back is covered.
To hear that it's not, it's a terrible, terrible experience.
The U.
S.
government today acknowledges the Americans at the U.
S.
compound in Benghazi were not adequately protected.
And says those who carried out the attack are still being hunted down.
Just a few weeks ago, Abu Anas al-Libi was captured for his role in the Africa bombings and the U.
S.
is still investigating what part he may have played in Benghazi.
We've learned that this man, Sufian bin Qumu, a former Guantanamo Bay detainee and long-time al Qaeda operative, was one of the lead planners along with Faraj al-Chalabi, whose ties to Osama bin Laden go back more than 15 years.
He's believed to have carried documents from the compound to the head of al Qaeda in Pakistan.
The morning after the attack, Morgan Jones went back to the compound one last time to document the scene.
He took these photos which he gave to the FBI and has published in a book he has written.
After all this time, he told us he's still haunted by a conversation he had with Foreign Service Officer Sean Smith, a week before the attack.
Morgan Jones: Yeah, he was worried.
He wasn't happy with the security.
Lara Logan: And you didn't tell him all your worries? Morgan Jones: No.
No, didn't want to-- Lara Logan: Why not? Morgan Jones: I didn't want to worry him anymore, you know? He's a nice guy.
I sort of promised him he'd be OK.
Lara Logan: You think about that? Morgan Jones: Every day, yeah.
The U.
S.
pulled out of Benghazi and al Qaeda has grown in power across Libya.
When a member of our team went to the U.
S.
compound earlier this month, he found remnants of the Americans' final frantic moments still scattered on the ground.
Among them Amb.
Stevens' official schedule for Sept.
12, 2012, a day he didn't live to see.
There may be no period that so dramatically redefined the world of U.
S.
intelligence than the decade following the September 11th attacks.
Through those tumultuous years, there was one man who was in the room for almost every important decision.
Mike Morell was deputy director of the CIA and gave us the only television interview he's ever done.
He spoke to us, largely because he believes the very nature of the spy business keeps successes in the shadows, but often pushes failure into the bright lights.
Morell operated in those shadows, but his insights have helped shape the key foreign policy decisions of the last three presidents.
The first thing we asked Morell about was the last thing he did at the CIA: taking part in the damage assessment on Edward Snowden, the NSA contractor who leaked classified documents about America's secret electronic surveillance programs.
Mike Morell: I do not believe he was a whistleblower.
I do not believe he is a hero.
I think he has betrayed his country.
John Miller: How serious a hit is that to national security? Mike Morell: I think this is the most serious leak-- the most serious compromise of classified information in the history of the U.
S.
intelligence community.
John Miller: Because of the amount of it? Or the type? Mike Morell: The amount and the type.
But of the hundreds of pages of NSA documents that Snowden has leaked, Morell pointed to one in particular that has caused a great deal of damage to U.
S.
intelligence.
It's a copy of the top secret document the CIA calls its "Black Budget.
" John Miller: What value would that have to an adversary? Mike Morell: The real damage-- of leaking that document was that certainly they could focus their counterintelligence efforts on those places where we're being successful.
And not have to worry as much about those places where we're not being successful.
John Miller: Kind of like handing over the playbook to the other team? Mike Morell: Uh-huh.
(affirm) John Miller: He went first to Hong Kong and then to Russia.
Do you think that China and Russia now have access to all or much off that material? Mike Morell: I think we have to assume that any material that Mr.
Snowden had with him has been compromised.
Protecting secrets is so engrained in the CIA culture that cell phones aren't even allowed in the building.
Meetings are held in lead-lined rooms called Secure Compartmented Intelligence Facilities, or SCIFS, and if there is one room where they discuss the most closely guarded secrets of all it is the CIA director's conference room.
Mike Morell: On an average day, you know, we're making hundreds of decisions-- a good number of them in this room.
And they range across the entirety of the national security issues that this country faces.
Mike Morell joined the CIA in 1980 as an energy policy analyst.
A self-described nerd, he wanted adventure, and he would soon find plenty of it, as he rose through the ranks and became the key intelligence briefer for President George W.
Bush.
Morell traveled with the president wherever he went and was with him at a Florida elementary school on September 11th, 2001.
Mike Morell: And what I'm actually standing there thinking is, "I wonder how long we're gonna be here," because everybody knows the president was going to be at this school on this date.
And, "Is somebody going to fly a plane into this place?" Morell would travel back to Washington with the president.
He was busy reviewing early intelligence the CIA had collected, when he was told to look out the window of Air Force One.
Mike Morell: And what you could see was an F-15 on the wing tip.
You could see the pilot's face.
And in the background, you could see the still burning Pentagon.
And that is a memory I'll never forget.
The CIA launched a plan to dismantle al Qaeda and even today, the single most controversial piece of that strategy was the use of "enhanced interrogation techniques.
" John Miller: Let me read you a list of some of the techniques that were used by the CIA to get information: waterboarding, hitting, bouncing suspects off walls, confining them in small spaces, loud music, sleep deprivation, nudity, keeping suspects in physical stress positions.
If these were Americans being held overseas by a foreign power, would we have called that torture? Mike Morell: I actually, John, want to challenge you on the word torture.
My officers carried out the guidance that was provided to them-- in both administrations, and obviously that was differing guidance.
What's my view? My view was that those coercive techniques were the wrong thing to do.
My view was that those techniques were inconsistent with American values.
And-- for that reason-- I don't think they should have been done.
No top CIA official has ever said that before.
In Morell's 33 years in the CIA, perhaps the boldest change in how the agency achieved results came literally out of the blue: armed drones in the skies over Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen became the go-to weapon to kill al Qaeda terrorist.
But the UN and others have said they have also caused hundreds of civilian fatalities.
Mike Morell: This is a very precise weapon.
Collateral damage is very low.
It's not zero, I wish it was.
But it is as close to zero as we have gotten with any weapons system in the history of this country.
There is no doubt in my mind that without these operations, that there would have been another attack in the homeland that would have rivaled the scale of 9/11.
To pave the way for military and intelligence operations including the use of drones, the CIA has reportedly supplied between $50 and $100 million over the past decade, in direct cash payoffs to President Karzai.
John Miller: Foreign aid is one thing, but cash in suitcases and backpacks to the president and key aides has a different feel to it? Mike Morell: It's all foreign assistance to the government of Afghanistan.
John Miller: Is there a quid pro quo here about you take care of me, and I'll allow unfettered drone operations in the country even though they're unpopular? Mike Morell: I think that those things that President Karzai allows the United States of America to do in Afghanistan are in the interests of Afghanistan.
The CIA has paid in cash, but also in blood during the war in Afghanistan.
At the agency's headquarters stars are etched into the marble marking the number of CIA officers killed throughout the Agency's history.
A ledger contains a list of names, but some remain classified.
John Miller: When I look here, I see Forward Operating Base Chapman, probably if not the worst, one of the worst, days for losses in CIA history.
Mike Morell: Absolutely.
December 2009.
We lost seven officers.
It happened at this base in the Khost province of Afghanistan.
A team of CIA officers waited for this man, Humam al-Balawi.
Mike Morell: Somebody that we hoped to be an asset of ours in this fight had essentially double-crossed us and detonated a suicide vest.
This was the first time that a CIA asset killed his case officer.
But while the attack in Khost was the biggest loss of life for the CIA since the start of the Afghan war, the biggest loss of credibility came with the intelligence that led to the invasion of Iraq.
Mike Morell: I think that my biggest mistake was not in scrubbing that analysis more closely.
I wish I would have done that.
After Iraq, CIA analysts were required to not just analyze the intelligence, but also give an assessment of their level of confidence in what the agency's spies were reporting.
Mike Morell: And so what we really learned from that experience was that analysts need to think about their confidence level and to be very, very clear with policy makers about it.
John Miller: That would happen today? Mike Morell: That would happen today.
John Miller: As a matter of discipline? Mike Morell: As a matter of course.
As a matter of discipline, as a matter of the trade craft of doing intelligence analysis.
And that Morell says was a key factor when the analysts were asked how sure they were Osama bin Laden would be found hiding in this compound in Abbottabad.
Mike Morell: The lead analyst put the number at 95 percent.
The collective group of analysts put that number at 80 percent.
Mike Morell: When I said 60 the president asked me, "Do you think we should do this?" And I said, "Absolutely" because I thought it was the best chance we ever had and might be the best chance we would have for a long, long time.
This photo, taken in the White House Situation Room on the night of the raid, was seen everywhere, but the operation was actually being run at CIA headquarters, inside this room.
Mike Morell: Place was packed with people.
Computers everywhere, video conferencing with folks in Afghanistan, the White House, folks at the Pentagon.
And just an awful lot of activity when the director and I walked in.
A picture captures the moment when Mike Morell and then CIA Director Leon Panetta heard the news: bin Laden had been killed.
Mike Morell: And that's when they said, "Geronimo, for God and country, Geronimo.
" And the director and I gave each other a hug at that point.
It wasn't a hug of happiness that bin Laden had been killed.
It was a hug of, "This is over.
This piece of this story is over.
" Today, bin Laden's gun which was never fired on the night of the raid, as well as the scale model of bin Laden's compound are on display at CIA Headquarters, and as Mike Morell finishes a career of 33 years assessing the strength and weaknesses of nations.
He believes America can manage most external threats, but as an analyst he sees our greatest vulnerability is one generated right here at home.
Mike Morell: What really keeps me up at night is the inability of our government to make decisions that will push our economy and our society forward.
And one of the things I learned looking at the world is that a country's national security, any country's national security is more dependent on the strength of its economy and on the strength of its society than anything else.
I think there is for some reason that I don't understand, John, there's been a change from a willingness of the two parties to work together to get things done to today, the two parties at each other's throat and simply trying to score political points.
And I don't know why that's occurred.
And I-- and I don't have a good understanding of how to fix that.
But that's what needs to be fixed.
The phrase "the greatest show on Earth" usually refers to the circus but a man named Peter Gelb, who runs the Metropolitan Opera in New York City, is doing everything he can to change that.
He is reinventing opera, making it accessible to more people -- even those who always thought they would hate it.
Gelb wants opera to become as popular and populist as it was a hundred years ago.
He believes people would come out in droves for opera if they just had a chance to see it.
There's no other place where you can see such monumental staging, elaborate sets and a cast of hundreds.
And raw emotion, beautiful women -- defiant and doomed -- and special effects that you might expect to find in a Hollywood movie.
But it's not just about the magic.
The Met is above all about extraordinary voices -- some of the very best voices in the world.
Beginning with rehearsals, we followed a new production, a reimagining of Giuseppe Verdi's masterpiece Rigoletto.
Polish tenor Piotr Beczala belts out one of Verdi's greatest hits.
Bob Simon: What's the difference between singing at the Met and singing in the smaller European houses? Piotr Beczala: It's the most important opera house in the world.
Bob Simon: Do you get more nervous before Met performance than at other performances? Piotr Beczala: Maybe a little.
Maybe a little because I know how important it is here.
Serbian baritone Zeljko Lucic sings the role of Rigoletto.
Zeljko Lucic: This is the-- kind of crown of our business, coming to New York and Metropolitan.
Because I know what kind of people, what singers sang here and stood at the same place where I am.
Bob Simon: In fact, when you sing the first time at the Met, is it a very big deal? Zeljko Lucic: Yes because that's your chance to prove yourself.
And if you are, you know, if you-- how-- how can I say, blew it out? Bob Simon: If you blow it? Zeljko Lucic: If you blow it, you're done.
That's it.
Unlike divas of the past German soprano Diana Damrau is a working mom, nursing a two-month-old baby and a cold.
She has a lot to contend with.
Bob Simon: You were quite sick last week? Diana Damrau: Yes.
I'm still a bit.
But I tried not to sing all the time, and reduce a little bit.
Bob Simon: Just a little bit, I mean-- you were belting it out.
Diana Damrau: Oh, no, only at the end.
Rigoletto is far from the only thing going on here today.
There can be as many as 10 operas in production at once.
Right now, the Met stage is being set up for a new version of Richard Wagner's Parsifal, a sacred opera that's never been done like this before.
Dozens of raven-haired maidens sloshing around in a river of blood -- 1,600 gallons of the stuff -- heated so the singers don't get cold.
Overseeing all this is that worried looking man, Peter Gelb, the Met's general manager.
He says opera is a blood sport.
Peter Gelb: I go in every day to the Met knowing that this is-- there is a battle to be waged and fought for the survival of this art form.
And so I'm here to do that.
Bob Simon: This is your seventh year at the Met.
Peter Gelb: Yes.
Still here.
Seven years micro-managing one of the biggest theaters in the world and one of the most expensive to run.
The Met employs over 3,000 people.
It spends more than a million dollars a day on its productions.
Peter Gelb: We are the closest thing to an opera factory that one could possibly imagine, except the difference is-- is that all of our factory workers are the greatest artists in the world.
[Stagehands: Right now.
We got it.
Singers: Wahoo!.]
Peter Gelb: We're doing seven performances a week.
Constantly going from opera to opera which is why our stage is busier than any other opera house in the world.
It's like a giant self-sufficient ocean liner.
But that liner was in danger of sinking when Gelb took over in 2006.
It was awash in debt with falling attendance and an audience which might not be around much longer.
Peter Gelb: It was way behind the times.
And it had become so mired in images of elitism that unless that changed, unless it was prepared to become accessible-- as opera once had been-- it was going to be very difficult for the Met to survive.
To make opera more accessible, Gelb opened up dress rehearsals to the public for free and put up huge screens in Lincoln Center and Times Square.
And he did something which has never been done before.
He began transmitting live performances in HD to movie theaters around the world, now in 64 countries.
Those broadcasts are money-makers - this year they grossed nearly $60 million, more than three-quarters of total tickets sold.
Peter Gelb: There's no opera company in the world today that has a global audience that the Met has because of these live HD transmissions.
Bob Simon: But you're still a hundred million dollars in debt.
How does that relate to everything you've done? Peter Gelb: Opera's always in debt from a business point of view, opera shouldn't exist.
I mean, it only exists because there are enough people who love opera and my job is to try to persuade them that it is necessary to change in order to keep the art form alive.
Otherwise it will die with them.
One of Gelb's strategies to keep opera alive is to update the classics, like Rigoletto.
After four weeks of rehearsals it's opening night.
Rigoletto has been performed over 800 times here but this audience, almost 4,000 here and another 350,000 watching in HD as far away as Tokyo, is about to see a radically different version -- 10 minutes before curtain, you can cut the tension with an A-flat.
Piotr Beczala: OK.
I'm ready.
Zeljko Lucic: It seems that I'm not nervous.
But--yea of course I am.
This is a big thing.
So I'm kind of, you know, cooking somewhere here-- you have this feeling that everything's-- that you are going to throw up.
[Stage manager: Gilda to stage right.
Ms.
Damrau to stage right.
Stage manager: Maestro to the pit, please.
Maestro to the orchestra pit please.
.]
Giuseppe Verdi set his tale of debauchery, lust, and vengeance in a corrupt court in its modern equivalent: Las Vegas in the 1960s.
The heartthrob, the duke, is now a big shot singer and casino owner with an eye for the ladies.
and those have been revamped too.
[Countess: Take it easy fella.
Duke: My hearts on fire.
Countess: Cool it, mister! Duke: You hooked me, baby.
.]
It's a big role of the dice for Peter Gelb.
Will the old guard be ready for show girls, a pole dancer? Even a sharp dressed hit man? His name is Sparafucileone of the longest names in opera.
Bob Simon: When you decided to put on Rigoletto in Las Vegas, what worried you the most? Peter Gelb: That I was heading for a disaster, but it's a risk worth taking.
The risk of doing nothing is the greatest risk of all.
In the last act the mood changes.
Rigoletto will not have a happy ending, very few operas do.
[Diana Damrau: Let's go and die.
Zeljko Lucic: Yea, but peacefully.
.]
The plot is much too complicated to explain but we'll just tell you Rigoletto's daughter sacrifices herself to save the duke.
It will be a spectacular death scene with the Met pulling out all its stops.
From the chorus back stage, to the lighting team, to the HD crew sending it out live around the world.
The hit man offs the daughter and stuffs her into the trunk of a 1960 Cadillac Coupe Deville.
She breathes her last in her father's arms.
At the final curtain the audience jumps to its feet, even the orchestra applauds.
That doesn't happen every day.
For Gelb, it was a good night.
But in opera, as in so many other things, you're only as good as your next night.