Hamilton has cancelled all performances this week.
A Chorus Line revival played its final Broadway performance on August 17, 2008. The tour played its final performance on August 21, 2011. A new non-equity tour started in October 2012 played its final performance on March 23, 2013. Another non-equity tour launched on January 20, 2018. The tour ended its US run in Kansas City and then toured throughout Japan August & September 2018.
I saw Hamilton again Oct 6 and can attest: they have one of the largest pools of covers of any show on B'way. Yet even they couldn't cope with double digit positives. As a friend working on a big show on the west coast informed me this morning, every show has a certain threshold of absences they can handle, varying greatly from show to show, based on how many roles each actor must cover. The decision to cancel isn't one size fits all. That seems a widespread misconception.
"I'm a comedian, but in my spare time, things bother me." Garry Shandling
Auggie27 said: "I saw Hamilton again Oct 6 and can attest: they have one of the largest pools of covers of any show on B'way. Yet even they couldn't cope with double digit positives. As a friend working on a big show on the west coast informed me this morning, every show has a certain threshold of absences they can handle, varying greatly from show to show, based on how many roles each actor must cover. The decision to cancel isn't one size fits all. That seems a widespread misconception."
Interesting - it seems to stand to reason, then, that as winter wears on certain shows might emerge as more or less likely to cancel than others, based on the number of absences they can withstand. Of course, though, as Auggie points out, even the largest casts will have their tipping points.
I saw A Christmas Carol yesterday in San Francisco (the Matthew Warchus production that was on Broadway in 2019). After reading this thread, I'll confess I was relieved when we were seated and the production actually *started.*
Our performance was down 3 or 4 people (no idea the reason). All of the swings and covers were excellent, but in light of this thread it got me thinking about exactly how many absences a given production can handle.
Kitsune said: "Our performance was down 3 or 4 people (no idea the reason). All of the swings and covers were excellent, but in light of this thread it got me thinking about exactly how many absences a given production can handle."
It's not only the actors/understudies but also backstage and tech folks too as finding a quick replacement for those folks is not easy.
Got an email that Irish Rep's performance of "The Streets of New York" is cancelled due to positive test result in company. I didn't have tickets so guess they sent the message to everyone on their email list.
Any update yet on Hadestown? It was set to resume performances tonight, but tickets are not on sale on SeatGeek and the perf is not listed on the official show website.
Jordan Levinson said: "Any update yet onHadestown? It was set to resume performances tonight, but tickets are not on sale on SeatGeek and the perf is not listed on the official show website."
I do not but the Hadestown website is blank to 12/28.
They need to announce something soon, this "wait RIGHT before the show thing" will not be something people will want to deal with much longer, I think it's just too stressful.
It’s interesting that their announcement doesn’t mention that someone in the company has tested positive, just that it’s out of safety surrounding the current covid conditions.
seatgeek was selling tix for 12/25 and 12/26 last week. It's safe to assume that those are canceled. The next performance is showing 12/28.
Had Sutton Ross said: "They need to announce something soon, this "wait RIGHT before the show thing" will not be something people will want to deal with much longer, I think it's just too stressful."
“Omicron has raced ahead of other variants and is now the dominant version of the coronavirus in the U.S., accounting for 73% of new infections last week, federal health officials said Monday.
In much of the country, omicron's prevalence is even higher. It's responsible for an estimated 90% of new infections in the New York area, the Southeast, the industrial Midwest and the Pacific Northwest.”
JBroadway said: "Hogan, can you be more specific about what you'd expect that to look like? What exactly do you mean by "managing coverage" and who would be qualified to do that?"
Shows came into this current crisis with essentially the same coverage plan that was in effect pre-covid. We've seen productions with folks unprepared/unrehearsed for slots, and we've seen productions nickle and diming their way forward one performance at a time. (This is starting to change in some but apparently not all productions.) What's needed is coverage that addresses the current state of the pandemic: beefing up the numbers and making sure everyone you are paying for a slot has been rehearsed. This involves spending money, but the alternative is to cancel performances. For shows that are doing well, that is a significant loss that far exceeds the extra cost. Any producer or general manager, together with company and stage management, would be qualified. My point I guess is that if this is not managed, the bedlam that ensues is going to kill any hope of avoiding a hiatus. Hamilton's cancellations are costing enough to buy someone a pretty nice one bedroom in the city every week that it goes on.