Les miserables revival struggling?

[Odie2]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 8:28am

I will admit from the start that this show is dear to me since I was a child and I am rooting for it to succeed but I am curious to know why so many on this board feel like it will close soon. 

The show was well received by critics and while I don't know how much it costs to run I saw somewhere that it grossed over 50 million since it opened.

I imagine that this staging is cheaper to run than the original because of the set, reduced orchestra, and all the principal characters except for valjean and javert play multiple characters on the show

They are able to spend money on advertising and do, Plus mackintosh has a war chest to spend on a show that he loves

It is a known show and good tourist attraction. And as far a Broadway shows go it is a safe bet for the casual theater fan that wants a quality show for the amount of money they will spend. someone like me who doesn't have the extra cash to spend on tickets, transportation, childcare will likely be drawn to a known show when deciding how to use that money 

For me Les miserables belongs on Broadway and growing up when I went to more shows it just seemed part of landscape and the theater scene. Is it cynisism that is causing so many predict that it will close or is there truth to it, because that would be disappointing

 

 

 

[kdogg36]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 8:34am

Well, I suspect that those who predict that Les Misérables may close soon are simply looking at the weekly grosses. There's no value judgment involved.

If you haven't checked out the site's review of weekly grosses, you can find it here. Welcome to the board!

[Bilbo3]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 8:37am

I wanted to like this revival, but it's pretty much just the touring show. There was no spark to it.  I'm definitely Les Mis'ed out. Terrible film and uninspired revival.

[matildathemiracle2]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 9:07am

I think Bilbo3 is completely right and people are just Les Mis'd out. They've seen the movie and I think it's safe to say that most people have seen some incarnation of the show at some point in their life, whether it be on Broadway, a tour, the movie, or a regional or local production of the show. With the current (great, IMO) season, I just don't think people are racing to the theatre to see the show when they could be seeing something else, new or long running.

[neonlightsxo]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 9:09am

It is a very expensive show and the numbers haven't been good. It's the same thing that happened with the last revival.

[dramamama611]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 9:16am

For a revival it's having a good run.   Most revivals run about a year to 18 months.  They are right in between that now.

 

 

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 9:44am

"I wanted to like this revival, but it's pretty much just the touring show. There was no spark to it.  I'm definitely Les Mis'ed out. Terrible film and uninspired revival."

I didn't think the film was terrible and I saw this production as a tour a few years ago and enjoyed it. But I am totally with you on the feeling of fatigue.

I love LM; I've seen it closer to 100 times than not. But I just haven't felt a pull to go back to this production multiple times like I had in the late '90s/early 2000s.

There were several excellent moments/cast members the two times I saw this revival, and I'm very happy that it seems to have captured the demographic that was drawn via the movie and was too young/too uninterested to have cared about the last revival -- but it's not hit me as something I need to see over and over again.

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 10:08am

"I think Bilbo3 is completely right and people are just Les Mis'd out. They've seen the movie and I think it's safe to say that most people have seen some incarnation of the show at some point in their life, whether it be on Broadway, a tour, the movie, or a regional or local production of the show. With the current (great, IMO) season, I just don't think people are racing to the theatre to see the show when they could be seeing something else, new or long running."

Hopefully, Miss Saigon shouldn't suffer from the same problem whenever that comes back.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 10:11am

Doubt it as Saigon has, I believe, never been revived on Broadway.

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 10:21am

Nope. http://www.playbillvault.com/Show/Detail/12256/Miss-Saigon 

[Jay94]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 12:33pm

It's doing okay. I'm not sure whether it will see out the end of the year but I'm sure it will pick up a lot over the summer. It's a safe bet for tourists as you said.

[Islander_fan]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 12:35pm

As someone who loves the show (including this revival) and one that can't get enough of the show in any form, there are a few comments I've heard time and time again while waiting to go inside from either tourists or bridge and tunnel theater crowds. 

 

I've overheard people talking about how they have seen the show in either one of it's tours or some local community theatre, but never on Broadway. Furthermore, I do genuinely believe that those seeing the show who are very casual theatre goers, A have clue that this is a different physical production than what has played before. And, B that if they saw this production on tour in their home city and seeing it in NYC on vacation, they wouldn't realize that it's the same one they saw.

There's an issue of finances here as well. As far as people (tourist, bridge and tunnel ocaisonal theatergoers)  are concerned they feel that Les Miserables has never closed and has been on Broadway forever. People are therefor, viewing this current production as such without realizing that that as far as finances are concerned  it's not doing well. People think that it's like Phantom in that it's been playing forever and can still run with discounts galore. However, that's clearly not the case. It's a brand new production and one that needs the money as such. But, for what it's worth, they did overhaul their ad campagin and put up a new marquee with the title in the original font both on the sides of the marquee in front of the theatre as well as a new one for the marquee in the back on 45th. Not saying that that indicates that they are going to keep the show open for awhile longer. Just an observation.  

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 1:03pm

Yeah, I meant to mention that too. I've had a couple of West Coast/midwestern friends who haven't been to NYC in 7-10 years and didn't realize Les Miz ever closed at all -- they thought it'd been running this entire time. I'm not sure if it being revamped/retooled/rebooted would've been good or bad to them, but it's something to note.

I do wonder why this production bothered to do a whole new (pretty nice) photo shoot and then roll out the new images a few weeks/months before most of the people in them were leaving. If they wanted to go for actor-proof, it certainly wasn't NOT showing their faces prominently.

[neonlightsxo]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 1:07pm

^ I found that bizarre as well. Yet they didn't use Chris McCarrell or Andy Mientus, it's someone else as Marius. Weird weird weird.

[HSky]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 2:12pm

The wall to the left if you're walking into the lobby was blank the other day. Wasn't the fan collage replaced with the newer artwork not too long ago? I wonder what's going up. 

[Odie2]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 3:25pm

I saw both the original and the revival and I liked the staging and acting in the revival more. Something about the blocking allows the actors more freedom to move so while the big numbers are still grand the little moments in the show have meaning too. 

Id love to know how much this revival costs to run each week and in general if revivals cost  producers more or less to mount when compared to new productions. 

[prouvaire]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 4:29pm

I saw the original production several times and I also prefer the revival. I like the new staging, the show as a whole feels more fast-paced to me, but more than anything I love this cast, particularly the ensemble. Many of the times I've gone back to see it during this past year have been because I wanted to see one of the understudies go on.

[ClumsyDude15]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 4:59pm

The photo shoot for the new ad campaign was done at a weird time when I don't think the new cast members had been cast/the previous cast members had decided to leave or not. I know Andy Mientus had been on leave to film The Flash while Nikki M. James was on vacation, prompting them to use Matt Rosell (the pictured Marius, who was one of the two covers while Mientus was on leave) and Briana Carlson Goodman (former tour Eponine and brief member of the ensemble before leaving to join Dr. Zhivago). 

I walked by last Friday night and the mural was still up, but by Sunday it had been painted over, so I'm not entirely sure what they plan to do there. I personally love this production, which is the sister to the national tour I saw in Philadelphia a few years back. I do hope the show continues to run and get people invested in not only Les Mis, but theater and Broadway in general. I've certainly heard plenty of people in my time seeing the show at the Imperial mention that it's their first show, and that's a special moment. 

Updated On: 5/7/15 at 04:59 PM

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/7/15 at 5:06pm

I'd seen Briana's instagram photos about the shoot and assumed she was replacing Nikki. It was all very strange. I'm a bit surprised they didn't just wait, though I suppose they wanted to coincide with a very similar photoshoot they did with the West End cast.