Alice Cooper - Billion Dollar Babies

Perhaps that is why her premiere was not successful. The audience was not ready for the perception of the emerging new opera aesthetics; she was still waiting for spectacular “special effects”, a familiar demonstration of virtuoso “colororates” and a plot from either a “sitcom” or Meyerbeer “historically grandiose”. Neither one nor the other nor the third was in Wagner's new creation. Yes, and the singers were not up to par. The public was perplexed: how could Wagner, after the brilliant Rienzi, offer her “something so uncharged, meager and gloomy”? Having survived only four performances, The Flying Dutchman was replaced by Rienzi, whose lasting success allowed its creator to finally make a career at the Dresden Royal Opera House.