NYT: Eleven Broadway shows closing soon

And 7 out of 11 are closing before Christmas!

I remember January 2009 being joked about as a rough time for closings, there was even an SNL sketch about it. But was it really that big of a year for closings or was it par for the course? Did people freak out just because Hairspray was closing?

Certainly I could be wrong, but I feel like if a long running show like Hadestown, Moulin Rouge, or Six were to be closing on January we would have already heard by now. No? As for shows like Tammy Faye, Maybe Happy Ending, or Swept Away it’s pretty standard that many closings from fall shows.

Call_me_jorge said: "I remember January 2009 being joked about as a rough time for closings, there was even an SNL sketch about it. But was it really that big of a year for closings or was it par for the course? Did people freak out just because Hairspray was closing?"

I don't think it was the number of shows closing so much, but rather the amount of "bigger" shows that most had anticipated would have run longer. Losing 3 Best Musical winners in a month is rare. One of those, Spamalot, was the hottest ticket in town when it opened and seemed destined to run longer than the 3+ years it did (Hairspray of course was a hot ticket too, but had run 8.5 years at that point). Then throw in 2 big musical revivals (Gypsy and Grease) and another new hit musical (Young Frankenstein) closing way earlier than expected, and it did start to feel a bit like a doomsday scenario, amplified by all the financial fears going on outside of Broadway at the time.

I might be naive, but this kind of feels like a normal yearly turnover? Like, we've got a handful of shows that may not survive January due to poor word of mouth (I am REALLY hoping the positive buzz surrounding Maybe Happy Ending gives it a bit more life) and some long runners winding down their life. Hadestown is a great show, but I've never felt the need to go back and see it again since I saw the original cast, all of whom were so wildly idiosyncratic that the production has struggled to replace them, so I'm not entirely surprised it didn't end up having a Hamilton/wicked-style longevity. Moulin Rogue is honestly a little bit of a surprise, and Six I have heard is looking to move off-Broadway, which would be disappointing but makes sense financially for them.

Here's my question: How normal is it for every theater to be booked during a Broadway season? Literally every broadway theater has a show either booked or running for the spring (the Lyceum is technically free but we all know either Oh Mary or Glengarry Glen Ross will be playing there). How normal is that? I'm on the west coast so I've only recently started keeping track of the broadway seasons. It seems like this is a LOT of shows, and it seems like anything that does close will have shows ready to swoop in and take them. What are the odds that we will see dark houses in April, and if so, how many?