Economic Depression will kill new shows this fall

I think because there is very little disposable income in this new recession the new shows coming in this fall are going to have a very very rough time surviving to the tony's.
BIlly Elliot, Shrek, TOTC, are all big musicals with huge Capitalization costs. Word on the street is that Shrek is upwards of a 30 million dollar musical. Wicked was 14 and it took a year and a half to recoup selling every night.
The fall and winter will be a scary time on broadway for new shows and running ones now.

I agree about the health of Broadway for at least a year, maybe (shudder) longer. Looking at it from a historical perspective, however, even in the depths of the Depression (say 1931-1934), some worthy shows did make it and made it big time: say, Girl Crazy; Mourning Becomes Electra; Anything Goes; Of Thee I Sing; The Children's Hour; Ah, Wilderness!; As Thousands Cheer; Face the Music; Gay Divorce; etc., etc. Granted, some of these and others that had a run may not have been of eternally great value, but the point I'm making is that there always seems to be some room for great theatre on Broadway. I'm naive enough to believe that if there's something out there that's truly worthy, somehow, some way, it's going to make its way through the cracks and against all odds. We may not get as much as we want, but there will be something.

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I'm not sure if you can equate this era to the Great Depression of the 1930's. The relative cost of launching a show was less then and so was the relative cost of tickets. I remember reading an account of a woman who recalled her mother never buying an ironing board when she was young because whenever she had enough money to buy one, she would instead spend the money for tickets for her and her daughter to see a Broadway show. (I think I recall that correctly, I read it in a film festival programme once.) The point of the piece is that the relative prices are a lot different.

What's different from the show that survived the depression and the shows now is that back then seeing a musical wasn't a big thing, it was as natural to a New Yorker as visiting Central Park or seeing a movie. Nowadays it costs a hell of a lot more to see a broadway show, it's not at the same place it used to be.

Back then the dilemma was: See a show or eat a big dinner?
Now it's more like: See a show or buy myself groceries for a week.

Plus, the internet is free, youtube is ubiquitous, cable is cheap, and none of these alternative distractions was available during the last depression.

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and yet tickets prices still go up!?!?! Doesn't make sense.

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"This isn't going to be as bad as the doomsday people will tell you it is."

No but people are still going to try to pass their crappy shows off on a bad economy.

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Maybe the flat out greed on broadway may have something to do with it.

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"and yet tickets prices still go up!?!?! Doesn't make sense."

Of course it does. If one can judge by the line at the Met Opera yesterday, the people who can afford to and want to will still see shows--and for the most part that's 90% of all audiences.

There will be a culling effect, of course. Producers will be far less inclined to poor money into probable busts like "Lestat" and "Tarzan"--shows that were riddled with problems from the moment of conception.

Inferior shows will close quicker but potential blockbusters liKe "Billy Elliot' and
"West Side Story" on the horizon will counterbalance losses taken by ill-conceived shows.

Perhaps the most-important indicator that Broadway will continue to thrive is that producers are still having a hard time booking theaters.

The end result is that brilliant theater like Michael Grandages "Don Carlos" will not have to be abandoned because all houses are occupied, many by second-rate productions.

The theater industry is quite similar to the airline industry in this respect: both have customers that need their products and in tough times poorly managed companies
flounder while quality products flourish.

Not to worry, barring a depression or a suitcase nuke going off at the Belasco, Broadway will do very well for the foreseable future,

"It is very likely that shows will be down-sized with more emphasis on content and less on wrapping, and that ticket costs will be moderated (or discounts made deeper and more readily available)."

I think the discounts will appear before any full prices decrease. There will always be people willing to pay full price, and they don't want to lose out on that.

I do wonder if this is the right economy for two Mamet revivals running concurrently.

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Frog_Fan 85:

You are my hero (or heroine).

As tough as it was to hang on THE LINE, it must have been diabolical to be cordial to people, quite a few of who, were agitated, to put their behavior in the best light.

At one point, at about hour three on the line, I think I had an out-of-body experience. I could see myself looking down at the line. My wife warned me it could happen and said, "Just don't walk to the light".

I do remember thinking, however, that it was reassuring to know Springstein or U2 weren't the only artist who could elicit such a response from the public.

God is in his heaven. Allis well. Broadway will not only endure but flourish.

I saw the brochure for The Damnation of Faust. The scenic design appeared to be stunning. Do you know anything about it or Mary Zimmerman's production?