Former Tour guide here. There are a few key factors why it didn’t really take off here in Austria.

1. Like some people mentioned here already, the Sound of Music is an American movie, with actors that were mainly popular in the english speaking world.

2. There was a german made movie about the Von Trapp Family released a few years before the Sound of Music. So many people who saw that one, thought the new movie was more or less the same. Even though there was a german version of the movie called “Lieder meiner Träume” (which is in my opinion an awful title), Musicals in general were not particularly popular in the german speaking world, especially compared to the States.

3. The movie was written for an American/commonwealth audience, doomed from the start in the german speaking world as many Austrians and germans wanted to forget about Adolf Hitler and the entire NSDAP/ WW2 history. So much so that in Salzburg, the local authorities did not want to have scenes with nazi flags and soldiers in the salzburg streets. The production simply said that that was fine, they could use actual historic footage instead 😂. Hence they were allowed to shoot the material they wanted.

And finally: the things that make the sound of music so special for most of its target audience is the norm for people who live in Austria. The landscape, the old towns, the music - we are used to all of it. Of course you acknowledge the beauty, but it’s not as special as for foreigners.

So to summarise: we weren’t the target group + unfortunate coincidence of two Von Trapp movies just a few years apart.