The Royal Opera House prides itself on knowing exactly who is registering on its mailing services, and just how high-class they are. Mr, Mrs, Ms, Miss, Dr, really can’t cover the possibilities. Hence the hilarity greeting their online registering process, which offers no fewer than 132 options for your title - which it is mandatory to fill in. These range from HRH The Duke of, HSH The Princess, HRH Sultan Shah, Senator, Ambassador, Baron, Marquess, Viscount and so on down to numerous different forms of Reverends, Rev Dr, Rev Mgr, Rev Preb, Very Rev throughout the highways and byways of church hierarchy.
Brigadiers, Generals, Commodores and Wing Commanders can be sure to be properly logged in, aristocrats of Spain and France provided the correct titular facilities, and the niceties that distinguish "Earl" from "Earl of" are decently observed. Presidents can register for tickets as easily as the common Mr, though there is a point beyond which your rank (or pay-grade?) doesn't interest the ROH: Sergeant doesn't make the cut.
Perhaps most pleasing is that “Queen” is also an option. Well, this is the Royal Opera House. (But though we know Her Majesty likes her laptop, wouldn’t she get A Flunkey to register for her? A Marchioness or a Lady, perhaps? Those options are provided, after all.) It's a little worrying, however, that "Pope" isn't on the list - we imagine he would be anxious to join Rabbis, Monsignors and Fathers in the Royal Opera House's online access. But without his correct title available - and with it being mandatory to choose the right one - His Holiness looks to be barred from the privileges of Covent Garden registration.
Overall it’s reassuring to see how go-ahead the Royal Opera House is in the digital age. Targeting your audience is everything in e-marketing now, and one can imagine the art insurance and private banking industries would eat broken glass in order to acquire such a list, filtered by royal bloodlines or diplomatic immunity.
One little mistake, though. We can’t help noticing “Princessin” - the German form of Princess - on the list of title options. If the Opera House staff check out their handy scores of Richard Strauss’s operas Ariadne and Salome, for example, they’ll find it’s Prinzessin with a z.
