Film releases a sign a show won’t return?

With a number of shows announcing film releases in September or earlier. Is this a sign that they may not take the risk of reopening? Like dear Evan Hansen and come from away. Along with Diana. Or are they seeing it as a chance to promote the show before it reopens. I cant see any shows except maybe six shows (six, Hamilton, phantom, lion king, wicked) reopening before the Christmas season.

I could really see shows like Mrs Doubtfire, Hadestown, Tina, cursed child and jagged little pill doing similar film options and then not reopening.

I wouldn't read too much into it. DEH is likely being aided by the fact that Ben Platt's father is a major Hollywood producer and this (seemingly) may be Platt's only shot at legitimacy. And since he is already significantly older than his character, they can't wait any longer if he's to star.

Diana was announced pretty early in the pandemic, so I wonder if Netflix had approached them before the pandemic. There are a lot of moving parts for stage productions to get filmed, and don't just happen overnight.

The producers of Come from Away were likely approached for filming as opposed to taking the initiative (there was an off-hand remark made in an interview by one of the producers last summer that can be read as a willingness to film the show as an alternative because of the pandemic)...but even if they weren't and initiated it themselves, I think it's likely they would have announced their intentions to close the show (same with the other two shows) if that were the case.

Think it's more like producers have realized the popularity of streaming platforms and want to strike when the iron is hot.

I don't think the Dear Evan Hansen film will affect the show. We have had movie versions of shows in the past while the shows were still running. It could possibly give the show a boost. I have friends who have watched "Hamilton" on Disney several times. They have tickets for it when the tour goes back out and they can't wait to get to the theater to see it live.

With "Diana", I am not sure but I don't think they were approached before the pandemic. I have a friend who was working on it and he didn't find out until a day before it went public. It was announced 6 months into the pandemic. I suspect he would have known before then.

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Diana was always going to be filmed even pre-pandemic, so I don't think this affects it at all (although I still wouldn't count on it necessarily reopening, but nothing to do with the film). Dear Evan Hansen is a movie adaptation, no different than when the Phantom movie came out. The Come From Away one is interesting and does make me wonder if that's a sign it may not return, but it's certainly still very likely it will come back.

At one time a film release doomed the stage production, but that's no longer true. See Phantom, Rent, and Chicago, for a few. The movie versions have come and gone, but the stqge versions keep on ticking.

The original production of HELLO, DOLLY! ran for several months after the rancid movie version was released.

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I have to disagree with a lot of the comments here. Although it has been long proven that a film version paradoxically actually boots ticket sales (see Chicago, Phantom), having a Hamilton-style pro shot film of the stage show is, in my opinion, a bad idea if you want to get people to come live. Personally, as much as I love live theater, I'm not going to pay $140 a ticket to see the tour of Come From Away if I can watch a pro shot of the stage show on my 70" television at home.

At the same time, I can't help but feel that the producers of Come From Away are filming it because they know many audience members won't see it live. Unlike Hamilton or Dear Evan Hansen, which cater to younger audiences, Come From Away's key demographic is your standard 45-plus, upper middle class audience. A lot of people in that demographic - specifically people age 60 or older and other high risk COVID groups - may choose to never go to the theater again or will only go if it is something they really want to see.

That said, I think that all theater is going to start to have live-streamed performances in the future. It will be like sports, in that of course it's more enjoyable to actually go to the game, but if one can't, watching it on TV is the next best thing. I'm talking two to three cameras, low cost filming. However if it's a six to eight camera, multi-million dollar endeavor like the Hamilton film was, to me that would signal the end of a show's run. It's like, "You didn't get to see it? Well, we're closing soon so here's what you missed." Hamilton might be the kind of show that is an exception however since it is so extremely popular and loved that people may go just to see a new cast interpret the material, and to have the the communal experience of seeing it live.