Broadway Prices In 2015

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 5:59pm

After seeing how quickly a new show goes over the previous highest ticket price, I was wondering what everyone thought prices would be say 5 years from now - say mid 2010 & beyond.

With the current shelf life of admission before it is surpassed, I say musicals will be priced at a top of $ 165 to $ 175 & straight plays will be $ 135 to $ 140

Anyone have any thoughts on this & how it would personally effect you. I am not "complaining" but just stating a truth as to what is happening going forward.

Updated On: 1/29/10 at 05:59 PM

[Patash]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 6:05pm

What are we supposed to say? Tell us first what the rate of inflation will have been and how much our paychecks will be in that year.
This is almost as meaningless as saying, "in 1960 top tickets were $40 (a guess on my part). How would those prices have affected your theatre going?"

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 6:10pm

Just a thought as to whether or not any show would be worth these prices. There are those who would pay any price. What effect would these prices have on tourists & local theatergoers?

Assuming you get a small rise yearly & inflation is not much of a problem. Ticket prices are far exceeding inflation & have been for awhile.

Updated On: 1/29/10 at 06:10 PM

[TheatreFan4]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 6:14pm

& by 2016 we'll be at $250 dollars. & by 2020 you'll need a loan to afford the tickets. By 2025 you'll need to take out a second mortgage.

[Barney Stinson]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 6:16pm

I think $175 per ticket for the best selling shows is pretty realistic for 2015. That won't be the average price, of course, but shows like Wicked will probably be charging that much.

Will it be worth it? Yes. If it wasn't, people wouldn't pay it. I find the prices somewhat ridiculous, but Bway shows are expensive to run, and are very risky, so producers/investors have to be compensated.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 6:24pm

If it is priced out of the reach of most people, everyone loses.

We just have to see fewer shows. Those are the breaks .

Posted: 1/29/10 at 7:34pm

Nothing better than to hear a rich old white guy whine about how he thinks the price of theater tickets is too high.

[jasonf]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 9:51pm

I think the real problem is that while the "upper" class will still be able to pay that much, once prices start creeping too high even the discount prices will be out of reach of many theater-goers. As it is now the discounts are 65-70 dollars, or about (maybe a tiny bit less than) what the full price ticket was when I went to my first show 20 odd years ago.

It gets old hearing people talking about why more people don't know shows - even some of us who love it can't afford to go when we want! Do you think people struggling to put money together to pay a mortgage and food in their mouths are going to blow a few hundred on a night's entertainment?

When the price of one night's entertainment at the theater for two can almost buy you a decent laptop, there's something SERIOUSLY wrong.

[madlibrarian]

Posted: 1/29/10 at 11:36pm

May I chip in as an old coot? The first Broadway show to charge twenty dollars for orchestra seats was The Act, circa 1978. (So that post about 1960 tix costing $40 was quite the LOL hoot!) Anyway, it was a big deal at the time, crossing the $20 line. But the cost of tix has--what?--quintupled or sextupled in thirty years. (Those "premium seats" are up by a factor of fifteen!) Nothing has risen like the cost of tickets... not rents, not gasoline, nothing. Somehow producers et al. must stop the inflation, or Broadway, I fear, will go the way of buggy whips.

[Mr Roxy]

Posted: 1/30/10 at 1:47pm

To Joe

"Rich old white man"? I doubt you would make a remark like that to a person of color & substitute black for white. Having said that, I am far from rich . If I were Donald Trump, I would not care. I am not so it affects me .

Next time you moan & whine & complain about something, I will make sure to call you on it. I guess rising ticket prices is not a topic for discussion on BWW but discussing endlessly about other topics having nothing at all to do with Broadway is OK

Makes no sense but I guess to you it does. Please note that according to Joe no one else is allowed to say anything about high prices . If someone does, I will report them to Joe immediately for severe chastisement. Seems like since ticket prices going thru the strastosphere does not concern him,maybe he is the rich old (fill in the blank)guy.

Updated On: 1/30/10 at 01:47 PM