In Baltimore on a Sunday with Lashings of Hairspray!

Today is the first performance of Hairspray on a Sunday, (Remembrance Sunday for the wrong reasons), this Sunday gig could catch on, or could as tickets were available from TKTS for 1/3 off?

Musicals that play on a Sunday

The Lion King
Thriller
Hairspray

Coming soon

Jersey Boys
Priscilla Queen of the Desert

Any other show confirmed to play Sundays?

I personally think this is awful, as actors/actresses are professional slaves, that now work all weekend and do not get deserved time with there families!

Updated On: 11/8/09 at 06:02 PM

Oh please Phantom come on!

There aint many complaining.
They get extra money.
They get to be home Sunday evening and don't return to the stage door until Tues night.
Two nights off not one!

'Prick Up Your Ears' Sundays at 4pm
'Change' Sundays at 4pm

Updated On: 11/8/09 at 06:24 PM

If producers were worried about actors having enough time with their families all performances would be weekday matinees with evenings and weekends off.

'They get extra money.'

They said this to shop workers, when the Sunday trading laws were relaxed, as a sop to look good in the media. I understand staff do not get a Sunday bonus anymore, same will happen with theatre once the trend has been set.

'They get to be home Sunday evening and don't return to the stage door until Tues night.'

Great, theatre personnel will be back home by 7-7:30 to say goodnight to their children, where they had a quality day off to spend with their kids, not really a fair compromise.

'If producers were worried about actors having enough time with their families all performances would be weekday matinees with evenings and weekends off.'

There are so many obvious floors in your argument, which you do not need me to point out.

"They said this to shop workers, when the Sunday trading laws were relaxed, as a sop to look good in the media. I understand staff do not get a Sunday bonus anymore, same will happen with theatre once the trend has been set."

if it's written in a contract that has been signed, they have no choice but to pay you extra. In my contract it was never layed down that i would get extra money for sundays just for bank holidays, but my sister who works in retail gets time and a half on a sunday, because that's her contract.

Actors aren't silly, they'll make sure they get whatever is promised to them.

Have to agree with Mamma and co here. There's more than enough people out of work who will happily work sundays. I'm avaliable for performances starting now and would happly do 3 shows on a sunday if they asked. Might not be ideal but theatre in London is supposed to be readily avaliable and with toursim obviously being higher at weekends it makes sense. Also it's started and is going to happen... simple as that!

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went to te first Sunday Hairspray matinee show and have to say there are A LOT of kids there, which can be good AND bad. Good because they do make the atmosphere more exciting with all the screaming and clapping but its bad cuz they can over-do it and spoil the atmostphere.
Oh well, I sat in the Stalls and I would say its 90% full which I guess is good for a first Sunday show?? The audiences were great. The energy in the cast is amazing too! Adrian Adrian Adrian... how can this guy get better and better everytime i see him?! Incredible! Those moves & notes, wow! The new cast, I liked Chloe a lot! Thought Liam sounded amazing, over-did the acting a bit, cute as a button but somehow just simple not handsome/boy-next-door enough. Phil as Edna.. hmm, enjoyable at times, but if you've seen Michael Ball or Adam Price in the role, you simply cannot compare to those 2 ~ I like Nicole as Amber, still preferred the previous 2 actresses who's done the role though. Tony as Wilbur was fine, the role really didn't have much to do. Sharon as Motormouth... her acting was slightly disappointing I have to say, or maybe I just had too much hope for her. But her vocals was A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. I'd see the show over again just to see her sing 'I Know Where I've Been' again! Gavin as Corny Collins was great. Who else did I miss out? OH.... Belinda as Velma.. you can really really miss her out! Vocals were mediocre to poor; acting nil; stage presence HUH?! I enjoyed the whole show, watched it too many times to judge really, but my friend who's a first-timer loved it. But she also thought Belinda was horrible.

Oh well... back to topic, I'm totally all for Sunday shows!

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If it were only to satisfy greedy producers, then actors would not work on shows that run on Sundays, and audiences would not go to see shows that run on Sundays. An actor's family knows they're not going to see mummy/daddy as often as they might like; it's part and parcel of the business. Sure, it blows that an actor might not get to spend as much time with their family now they're working on Sundays, but the decision to not have as much of a life as they might like is the one they made when they went into the business. And if the alternative is spending 24 hours a day, 7 days a week with the family thanks to unemployment, then you can kinda see why people might not mind working Sundays.

Another bonus of Sunday shows is that more people can go see them than a midweek performance. More people = more ticket money = more employment! How is *that* ever a bad thing for this mercurial industry?

Sundays aren't exactly sacred to the vast majority of the population any more anyway. And I'm glad no one's brought up the sanctity of Sundays to religious types yet, 'cos then we'd have to get into the whole "is it fair to make Jews perform on Saturdays?" conversation, and that obviously hasn't bothered Broadway ANY! XD

Vote with your ticket money; if you don't approve of Sunday performances, don't go to any. Vote harder: don't go to any shows that have a Sunday performance no matter what day of the week it is! And if you bump into an actor who performs in a show with a Sunday performance, feel free tell them you're purposefully not coming to see their show because you think they're being treated like slaves and it's disgusting. And please take a dictaphone, because I'd be TOTALLY interested in a full write-up of that encounter!

(Love the "professional slavery" hyperbole; reminds me of Terrence Howard. ^_^)

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Updated On: 11/9/09 at 01:34 PM

Phantom while I agree with much of what you say, and anyone saying people working weekends doesnt affect family time is living on another planet. The reality is Sunday shows make MUCH more sense, and in this day and age there are MANY jobs that involve weekend working...not just shop workers. I dont feel we should be saying 'poor west end actors having to work Sundays', afterall there are many others out there having to do the same thing in other industries.

It does raise the issue of weekend working as a whole and the affect it may have on the family unit.

I think, given the potential revenues of Sunday shows, West End actors / employees have dodged this bullet for a LONG time. I'm one of the masses who has to work Sundays (albeit not every single one), but I actually prefer it and welcome the time I get off in the week in lieu. As others have already said "professional slavery" it is not - if it offends some potential 'victims' so much they should refuse to sign new contracts / seek alternative employment!

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Surely nobody HAS to work 'unsocial hours' if they strenuously object to them, but I'd hazard a guess and say Call Centre workers / Nannies / Au Pairs / utility company employees / cinema ushers / restaurant staff are all as 'hard done by' (and probably more so) than theatre employees in the West End who are only just having to adjust to working Sundays.

I don't honestly think the state of industrial relations in the US has anything to do with this decision - I love the US but I wouldn't want to work there. But opening shows on Sundays (when a lot of your potential audience have time off - notwithstanding the sizeable minority who don't!) makes sound economic sense - for all involved!

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Most 'ordinary' people work an 8 hr day.
One performance on a Sunday will probably take between 3 or 4 hrs out of a Sunday. AND double pay! AND then your off until 6.30pm Tuesday night.

The vast majority of "professional" jobs offer far more antisocial hours than being in theatre. Doctors and policemen can be on call in the middle of the night; high-powered lawyers, bankers, civil servants etc. are expected to work beyond their contractual hours without complaint and well into the small hours on a regular basis. And they have to be at work for 9!

For staff working at a theatre in some capacity the hours aren't bad at all. Once your first night comes round, apart from fairly infrequent rehearsals/tech runs the people actually doing the show (whether techy or turn) turn up a few hours before the show and leave straight afterwards. You've got all day to catch up with people, and most shows will still offer you some weekend time; with no matinee on the Sunday you can catch up with folks then. Plus box office/front of house staff are on shifts!

Sunday working on some schedules is a bit of a bugger (Tuesday matinee on Legally Blonde? No thank you!) but most producers will still be giving their artists and technical staff the same amount of time off - a day and a bit.