BRING IT ON opening night Playbill- question

[loliveve]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 9:42am

I have two "opening night" Playbills from Bring It On- but what is curious is that one is in black and white, and one is in color. The one in color I got from the stage manager, and the other someone else gave it to me when I mentioned I'd seen the show.

Anyone know whether the theatre handed out the color ones on opening night? I am kind of puzzled by this!

Thanks!

[ZoeTheGoat]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 11:39am

Who cares? Is it really that important for you to find out if the theater handed out COLOR programs on opening night? My god, this is dumb.

But YEA, they probably handed out color ones on opening night (like most show)...

next.

Updated On: 7/18/13 at 11:39 AM

[dreaming]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 12:27pm

I don't think it's that dumb of a question. The person just wanted to know about the provenance of their item. I've seen and heard much dumber questions than that. (For the record, I was at an opening where the playbill was NOT in color. (Actually make that 2 shows.))

[loliveve]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 12:41pm

Quite frankly, which was handed out is not that to me. I'm wondering because they are obviously different Playbills. (I think one has the contents of July and the other has the contents for August.)

Given the differences between the two "opening night" Playbills, I was just plain curious.

[Visceral_Fella]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 3:23pm

I remember receiving the color playbill when I saw the show on tour. The playbill changed to B&W when the show went to Broadway. I'm pretty sure the B&W one is the opening night playbill.

I also do not think that this is a "dumb" question. There is a less than educated response on here, but this is not a "dumb" question.

[Fosse76]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 4:01pm

In general, there is no "official" opening night Playbill. The opening night date is printed on the title page for that entire week's shipment of Playbills, so what you receive on opening night is whatever the usher grabs for that evening.

For musicals, in my experience, the theater receives an excessive amount that easily carries over from week-to-week. So in the case of Bring It On, the usher's probably grabbed whatever stacks they saw, making no distinction between the color Playbills and black and white. If the opening night date is on the title page of both the color and black and white, then that is just bizarre...I can't imagine that Playbill would split a shipment like that.

On the rare instances that you get an opening night sticker, that is put on the Playbill by ushers, who would, again, just grab whatever stacks they see and start sticking.

[loliveve]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 6:32pm

Fosse76- Thanks for the info! That explains why I've gotten Playbills with the opening night date a few days before opening, and I think explains why the opening night date appears in both the color and B&W Playbills I have for BRING IT ON.

Opening night for the show was August 1 and that was a Wednesday, so maybe two shipments were made: the first in color with the July articles, and the second in B&W with the August articles. At least that's what I'm going with.

[LuminousBeing]

Posted: 7/18/13 at 11:27pm

Not entirely related, but: I saw "Peter and the Starcatcher" on Opening Night, and there's absolutely nothing about the Playbill that differentiates it from a Playbill I received for a performance I saw several months later.