Broadway Grosses: Week Ending 5/18/14- Page 2

[BobNC]

Posted: 5/19/14 at 11:00pm

So glad '"Beautiful" is still going strong. I definitely hope it wins Best Muical.

[Sutton Ross]

Posted: 5/19/14 at 11:04pm

"What if Sara Ramirez did if/then? "

She completely abandoned any and all theater the moment she got her Grey's contract. No thanks.

[Bway_Mill_Fan]

Posted: 5/19/14 at 11:11pm

You mean she's busy with grays or too cool for theater?

[ACL2006]

Posted: 5/19/14 at 11:24pm

Gentlemen's Guide was over its capacity, so the only way it can increase their grosses is if discounts start to be taken away.

[AntV]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 5:40am

I don't even know this for certain, but I can safely assume All the Way was back to a normal 8 show schedule last week and the 6 show performance number is an error copied over from last week. The number of seats sold is much more alike with the number sold for 8 show weeks.

[tmbyru]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 7:45am

Go Beautiful!! Best show this season.

[broadwaydevil]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 10:38am

"Gentlemen's Guide was over its capacity, so the only way it can increase their grosses is if discounts start to be taken away."

And that will happen in due time. Most of these ticket sales for Gentleman's Guide have come from when discounts were plentiful. The current codes I've seen only go through June 8th and there likely won't be more for some time if they win Best Musical. At that point, grosses will go up.

I'd also like to know on what planet 75% of potential gross is underperforming. The show is making a healthy profit with those numbers and it's certainly not a bad number by any stretch of the imagination on a non-holiday week for a show with no stars or built in audience.

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 11:14am

I'd also like to know on what planet 75% of potential gross is underperforming. The show is making a healthy profit with those numbers and it's certainly not a bad number by any stretch of the imagination on a non-holiday week for a show with no stars or built in audience.

Especially since they were only at about 50% of potential gross during the period between Christmas and the Tony nominations announcement.

[Up In One]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 12:16pm

Taking seven months to get to 75% of potential is not typical. But the 100% capacity is great that means people want to see it and many were shut out last week which should translate into advance sale. Each show has its own micro-climate of success based on start up budget, weekly running costs and seating capacity. Rocky sold close to 2,000 more tickets last week at the Winter Garden but assuming its running costs are far higher than Gentleman's and knowing its capacity is greater its numbers aren't looked on as doing as well. I do wonder how low Gentleman's weekly running costs are. Were they covering costs in those many lean weeks or were the producers dipping into overage to keep it going?

[Liza's Headband]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 1:32pm

Do not forget they have the added luxury of financial safeguards via Roundabout's private assets and charitable support. I don't profess to know any inside info, but I imagine the Board would always be open to using some of reserve for covering losses of their most worthy theatrical ventures as long as it benefited their image and reputation in the community. Between the reviews and the Tony nominations, this show certainly does.

[broadwaydevil]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 1:49pm

Except Gentleman's Guide isn't produced by Roundabout.

Running costs are about $450,000, which means it's still far from recouping (it'll need lots more big weeks like this one over the summer) but it hasn't had many losing weeks since it opened besides some sluggish sales in March.

[BrerBear]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 2:28pm

Running costs are about $450,000, which means it's still far from recouping

Really curious where that information comes from... best guess, inside information, or is there a place to find out? Seeing as how Gentleman's Guide has such a tiny cast and orchestra, as well as no complex sets or rights negotiations I wonder where all the expense goes.

[dreaming]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 2:44pm

I thought they had rights issues with the film "Kind Hearts and Coronets". I am wondering if they're paying something to them. But $450,000 isn't that outrageous for a show. (They have to pay the cast, musicians and the stagehands as well as the crew.) But, they better work on the marketing. I enjoyed it-it's very cute and clever-but it's not the type of show the summer tourist goes to see (the bridge and tunnel variety, maybe).

[givesmevoice]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 2:48pm

Gentleman's Guide has a FANTASTIC social media team, but obviously you wouldn't see that unless you already like them on Facebook or follow them on Twitter.

[broadwaydevil]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 2:58pm

Brer - Friends with the show. Most shows aim to have their running costs to run at about 50% of gross potential, so that's a good general rule of thumb. A Gentleman's Guide just happens to run exactly there.

Obviously, costs can vary if anyone is being paid for a star contract, if there's a particularly large cast or massive sets and technical requirements (like Spider-Man or Rocky) and also tend to decrease over a show's run.

The lawsuit was dismissed and nothing is being or has been paid out.

[bdn223]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 3:00pm

I highly doubt A Gentleman's Guide's nut is $450,000. I could see it in being somewhere between $400,000+$425,000, but not $450K. I doubt it head producers, which seem experienced would produce a show with no star, no name, new to Broadway writers, and put it in a house where its nut is over 50% of its maximum gross potential. It would be financial suicide.
And yes $25K makes a huge difference in profitability especially for a show you know will not be a smash hit, just look at Next to Normal as a comparison.

[binau]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 4:56pm

Can we please cite where this "50%" gross potential comes from?

In the case of FOLLIES, their nut was 100k less than 50% of their gross potential according to the NYtimes, and it just seems to be an arbitrary figure that is unlikely to always work out like that. Where does this idea come from?

[broadwaydevil]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 5:14pm

That's why it's a rule of thumb. It doesn't always turn out to be exact, or even near the actual numbers. The reason that it exists is because it's the target for most producers. A producer chooses the theatre (with corresponding rent costs) and prices seats in order to make a profit - obviously I'm only talking about commercial productions. Seats are typically priced in such a way that if a theatre earns around 50% of full priced revenues, the show will break even. Sometimes that number is 40%, sometimes it's 60%, but 50% is the generally accepted approximate average. Why you might ask? A number in that neighborhood means a show will be making money as long as it's a moderate success and producers can discount as long as sales are good and still make a profit. If you require a much higher gross potential percentage to earn a profit, discounting will kill the show and you need to be near capacity every performance, which isn't realistic for most productions. If your required gross percentage is much lower, it likely means artificially-high ticket prices are inflating the overall potential gross and more tickets and ultimately greater revenue will be found by lowering prices.

It's often the case that shows in huge houses (like Follies) are planned by producers to break even at far below 50% since they don't anticipate sellout crowds. On the Town coming into the Lyric will probably follow a similar model (I don't know the financials on it, so I'm just guessing).

[Marquee2]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 7:20pm

Is "Mothers and Sons" in danger of closing? How has it lasted this long after such mediocre reviews and playing to so many empty seats?

[binau]

Posted: 5/20/14 at 10:30pm

Ok, thank you broadwaydevil. Can you confirm that information comes from a producer?