Tours · Hannover · opera_house
Dog Dirt at the Premiere - Opernhaus
On the night of 11 February 2023, inside this elegant opera house, the opera's ballet director smeared dog excrement on the face of a dance critic from the FAZ newspaper, turning a world premiere into a scandal that ricocheted around the global press within hours.
Sobre este lugar
The Niedersächsische Staatsoper Hannover opened in 1852 and was painstakingly rebuilt after heavy bomb damage, reopening in 1948 to become one of Germany's leading opera and ballet houses. Yet it was not a soprano or a scandal in the orchestra pit that made headlines in early 2023: it was the opera's own ballet director who, during the interval of the premiere of Glaube Liebe Hoffnung on 11 February 2023, approached an FAZ dance critic who had written a series of withering reviews and smeared the faeces of his dachshund across her face. He was suspended within 48 hours, his contract terminated within five days, and by 30 November 2023 prosecutors had closed the criminal case, which they had classified as a tätliche Beleidigung, an assault-type insult, against a payment in the mid four figures. He had apologised publicly several times. The incident became one of the strangest arts-world confrontations of the decade, prompting debate across Europe about critical power and artistic ego.
Datos clave
- 1852 year — The Niedersächsische Staatsoper first opened its doors, making it one of the oldest surviving opera houses in northern Germany.
- 5 days — It took just five days from the night of the incident to the termination of the ballet director's contract on 16 February 2023.
- 4 figure settlement — Prosecutors dropped the criminal case on 30 November 2023 in exchange for a payment in the mid four figures, with no conviction recorded.