La Jolla Playhouse’s Post

Are Broadway shows moving to earlier evening start times? That seems to be a trend as some shows address the post-pandemic decline in audiences, especially from suburban areas. Historically, evening performances started at 8:30 p.m., but have since shifted to 8:00 p.m. More recently, shows have been moving start times to 7:00 or 7:30 p.m. and adding more matinees, catering to families, tourists, and older audiences who prefer earlier shows. Matinees, particularly on Thursday afternoons, have become more popular than Saturday nights. Shows like Disney’s “Aladdin” and “The Lion King” now feature 6:30 p.m. performances on Sundays. Some productions, like “Oh, Mary!,” are opting for two evening performances instead of a matinee. The ongoing adjustments aim to get theaters back to capacity. #theater #broadway #onstage #tickets #boxoffice https://lnkd.in/e3z7Pgyd

How #Broadway #Entertainment can invigorate your #events! Do you have a client that is looking for fresh, new entertainment concepts that deliver plenty of “wow” factor? House Down Productions provides exactly that – event entertainment that is unexpected, exciting, and will leave your client wanting more. Our veteran Broadway performers bring a unique set of skills that can take your clients’ events to the next level. Incorporating Broadway talent into your events can be a game changer in terms of: Storytelling: Our performers are working Broadway actors who engage with and captivate audiences every night. They make their living telling stories on stage, and they will bring this same approach to your clients’ events. This ensures your client’s story is heard loud and clear. That “wow” factor: Our performers are not only some of the best singers in the world, but SELL their performances like nobody else. Not only will your clients be blown away by their voices, but they will be entertained and moved. Theme: It goes without saying that our singers can sing Broadway tunes. But are you looking for 80’s rock, Motown, jazz, or 90’s pop? They can do that too. Broadway shows represent all these styles and our singers can do it all –seamlessly integrating your event’s theme and delivering a cohesive experience. Discover how the perfect partnership between Broadway and business can take your events to the next level. Contact us to learn more about how we can collaborate to create memorable experiences for your clients.

We’ve Hit Peak Theater Nobody knows how to succeed on Broadway anymore. The resulting drop in demand has already lasted longer than the dips Broadway saw after 9/11 and the Great Recession. Audiences are down 17 percent since the boom season of 2018–19 with older suburbanites accounting for most of the falloff. “The drop was at 50-plus,” Producing on Broadway, where roughly 80 percent of shows fail to recoup, has always been a leap of faith. Yet Tonys no longer guarantee solvency. It used to be that if a show won Best Musical, it would earn its money back. Moulin Rouge! The Musical, the last winner to open before the pandemic, ultimately reopened and recouped. The next two winners, A Strange Loop and Kimberly Akimbo, failed to break even before closing. That hadn’t happened since 2002. The capitalization of Broadway shows this season adds up to $410 million, compared with $290 million last year, according to Broadway Journal columnist Philip Boroff. Before 2023, only a handful of shows were ever made for more than $20 million. This season, there are at least five, topped by Cabaret, which at $26 million is the most expensive Broadway revival in history. This can’t be pegged purely to inflation. Titanic would have cost $19 million in today’s money In November, Boroff reported that Water for Elephants has weekly operating costs of $960,000; Back to the Future costs $980,000 to run, and Cabaret needs $1.16 million to break even. Before the pandemic, $700,000 was considered to be very high. According to a 2023 Broadway League report, the average age of a theatergoer is now 40.4, the youngest in at least 20 years. https://lnkd.in/ds6a-aeF

Here’s my review of Broadway in Tucson’s “Hairspray.”

The 2023-2024 Broadway season has officially come to an end and the Broadway League has released the stats. The season grossed $1.54 billion, slightly down 2.4% from the previous season, with 12.29 million admissions, almost unchanged from last year. Despite these positive figures, they have not yet returned to pre-pandemic levels from the 2018-2019 season, which saw $1.83 billion in gross and 14.77 million attendees. However, theater capacity was high at 89.63%, close to 2018-2019's 89.75% and higher than last season's 88.35%. There were 1,471 playing weeks, slightly fewer than the previous season, but attendance per playing week increased to 8,353 from 8,333. The season saw 39 new productions, including 21 musicals, 16 plays, and 2 specials. #theater #broadway #onstage #boxoffice #tickets https://lnkd.in/ed_i2PKY

Just posted on DCTA, my review of the fabulous BROADWAY EN SPANGLISH by Florencia Cuenca and Jaime Lozano at 54 Below (and here it is with the featured image):

The awards season for New York theatre broke into full swing this morning with the Drama League nominations. More will soon follow including the #TonyAward nominations, which is theatre's highest honor. And each year this time I find myself perplexed, disgruntled, curious, annoyed, pleasantly surprised, delighted and any number of reactions to the plays, musicals and individual artists singled out by the industry for exceptional achievement. One area that is consistently inconsistent and persistently unfair it seems to me is in the revival categories. There are shows that were never before performed on Broadway ("Appropriate" for example) that have been deemed a revival by the Tony Awards. Ostensibly because that show was performed off-Broadway without sweeping changes to the play and so therefor revival status is justified. Do I have that right, Tony folks? So why then was a play like "Fat Ham" (nominated for five Tony Awards last year) which transferred from off-Broadway's The Public Theater to a Broadway house with little change and the same cast (I saw both productions) placed in the category of Best New Play? In all this is there jockeying for placement to up a production's chances of winning? Nah, that couldn't possibly happen in show business! But this does beg the question if it isn't time for more clarity, transparency and fairness in the categories in which shows and even certain performances (lead vs. featured) are determined. #Broadway #EntertainmentReporter #TheatreReporter #ArtsJournalist #OpenToWork #Writer #Producer #TVJournalist

Final main article of my freshman year at The Review, and it's (you guessed it, maybe) a Broadway piece! This time, it's a recap of what shows stopped by in the 2023-24 season! Writing about Broadway is so much fun. Read it here: https://lnkd.in/epaXA56S (Also as a guessing game, which shows are in the visual done by Lillian Conlan?) it may or may not have stumped the A&C crew!

'A behind the scenes look at theatre investment' is the title of an article in Spear's Magazine by Suzanne Elliott. It is insightful and well worth reading for anyone interested in taking the plunge in investing in a stage play or musical. One stand-out quote is this, "The arts and culture industry is worth £10.8 billion a year to the UK economy and a whopping $876.7 billion in the US and nearly all producers – even big names on Broadway and the West End – require private investments to help raise the curtain." https://lnkd.in/gngbDjvV #theatre #theatreinvestment #musicals #culture #wealthmanagement

Going back a little, to December 2023, an article was published which began, "If only you'd invested in Phantom... or Matilda... or Hamilton. Peek behind the curtain: the tricky art of investing in theatre productions." Things are already moving on since that was written, but it is still insightful. https://lnkd.in/gM3iZzQX #theatre #musicals #theatre #theatreinvestment