The coffee-centric web site Sprudge.com seems somewhere between baffled and bemused at the Ig Nobel audience reaction. They write:
Ig Nobel Prize “Chemist In A Coffee Shop” Mini-Opera
Baffling. We thought we knew nerds. But these nerds out-nerd the nerdiest nerds we’ve ever dreamed existed. These are opera singing nerds. These are nerds that throw paper airplanes in a crowded hall, at a full grown nerd-man dressed as a “human aerodrome”. Quick! Nerd crew! Clean up those paper airplanes! Glegh! Glegh! Nerd opera starts around 28:50. The nerd crowd hushes as the nerd narrator begins, “Tonight’s opera is about a coffee shop.” Silence. “It’s also about chemistry.” (Genuine whoops and nerd hollers from the nerd crowd).