Why are ballet runs so brief?

[Zsofia]

I'm not sure if that's the right word in the title - in town, at least, they only run a ballet show for a few days. Why is that? Not enough interest?

They just came up with this entirely new ballet here, Cleopatra. All new costumes, all new sets, choreography, everything. Huge expenditure of effort and cash, right? So why on earth did it only run for two days? Granted, I'm sure they'll make an annual thing of it - but I wanted to see it, and I figured it would run more than two days! Is it the same in bigger cities?

I realize the performances must be exhausting, but those Broadway people work hard too and they hope like hell to run for months, right? Are ballet runs just traditionally shorter? Can they just not sell more than two days worth of tickets?

[friedo]

Because nobody likes the ballet.

[MsFancyPlants]

Perhaps most of the cast and crew are volunteers as opposed to paid professionals. It may be hard to get a large group of volunteers to work a long series of dance performances.

[Telemark]

http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1083/is_6_74/ai_62685085

This article has some details about the financial side of creating and staging a new ballet.