And once sanctification starts you lose the masses. The masses don’t like having to dress up just to go sit in the dark. Maybe some of the theaters should start having “no tie” nights, get the “ra” back in “opera”, something to eject the stodgy atmosphere, and the people that like it, get the t-shirt crowd. The t-shirt crowd is willing to sit through Queensryche playing all of Operation Mindcrime, or Pink Floyd playing The Wall, or The Who playing Tommy or Quadrophenia, they actually can handle the big long musical story thing so long as they can dress comfortably.
The thing is you don’t have to dress up. I go in jeans. I’ve been to the Met in jeans.