The piece premiered in Berlin on 3 October 1883 in the , and it is Strauss's only operetta to be premiered outside Vienna. Although the press praised Strauss's music, they criticized the libretto as banal and silly; for instance, references were made to roast beef made from the sole of a boot and, in the waltz scene, the character of Duke Urbino was singing passages of "meows", which was met with much embarrassment from the Berlin audience. Unperturbed, Strauss made several alterations to the work with his librettists and scored a triumph in his native Vienna at the Theater an der Wien, where it ran for 44 consecutive performances from 9 October 1883. The operetta became established as one of Strauss's three most recognisable stage works alongside "Die Fledermaus" and "Der Zigeunerbaron". A 1923 production, starring Richard Tauber at the Theater an der Wien, used a score and libretto revised by composer Erich Wolfgang Korngold and writer Hubert Marischka, which was later used in other productions and recordings.