Riedel: $18 Million 'Pirate' A Historic Flop- Page 3

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 6/7/07 at 11:27pm

CATS, Brooks did not make it official that Young Frankenstein was going into the Hilton.

[amalou]

Posted: 6/7/07 at 11:40pm

God all friggin mighty. I think it's just about the meanest thing to take glee in a show's closing. Just because you thought the show was bad doesn't make you wrong, but it really is just cruel to rub it in and kick it while it's down. I dare any one of you to go up to anyone involved with Pirate Queen and say something nasty to their face.

Go up to the cast and tell them how much the show they worked so much for sucked. Tell the producers and writers that they're stupid. I F-ing dare you! There is absolutely not ONE scrap of respect, decency or curtesy on this board. You can be objective about something and that's one thing, even if opinions clash. But I think the classy thing to do would remain objective or at the VERY LEAST, wait a little while to say mean stuff about the show. I know it's very difficult to add one more thought to a tiny brain, but there ARE people out there in the world with opinions different than your own. People loved this show. People on this board loved the show and perhaps right now they're a little sad. I'm not saying don't voice a negative opinion or fact or whatever, but saying things like "the show sucked" and "I'm happy it's closing" is pointless, rude and just mean. So quit it.

It's so easy to sit behind your computer screen and say the meanest thing you can think of without giving a second thought that it might be disrespectful or hurtful.

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 6/7/07 at 11:49pm

Okay, seriously, I like The Pirate Queen too, but you're taking it all a little too personally. There are people who take pleasure in the failure of shows. That will never change. Daring them to say that to the cast or calling them cowards behind the computer screen isn't helping matters.

And though it was not technically officially announced that YF would take the Hilton prior to the posted closing notice of The Pirate Queen it was heavily implied and rumored by Playbill.com of all places.

[Patti LuPone FANatic]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 12:05am

Having seen Stephanie Block in the tour of "Wicked" in Dallas, she is a phenomenal talent. I'm sure that after a proper rest, she'll be a great asset to any show. It's 11:05 p.m. (cst)... I'm going to bed. nite nite...

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 12:07am

According to Wikipedia, SUNSET cost $10 million. And, while it ran for two years, it did not make any of that money back.

So, though it was expensive, it looks like its not the BIGGEST financial flop in Braodway history...

According to Wikipedia, Kevin Anderson "has been nominated for several Tony awards and won at least one" which is false. He has been nominated once, and lost.

So I don't know how valid a source Wikipedia is.

I do know that a major reason that SUNSET is considered one of the biggest flops in history relates to the settlements paid out to Patti LuPone and Faye Dunaway over their breach of contract law suits -- all of which came from the SUNSET fund. Patti has stated on her site that she was paid one million dollars as a settlement.

[TechEverlasting]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 1:18am

I am so sick of hearing that the problem with Pirate Queen is that there's no market for 80s style sung through pop-operas. Meanwhile Phantom continues its long succesful run and Les Mis has become once again a bona-fide hit. The problem with Pirate Queen is not its genre, it's the astonishingly inept writing.

I'm not taking glee in this show's closing. I'm truly pissed off about this entire situation. What an incredible waste of money and effort! What the hell is the point of doing an out-of-town tryout if you aren't going to pay any attention to the response the show receives? Pirate Queen needed a complete rewrite and a new workshop after Chicago, not one new song, 6 more minutes of dancing and a few clever lines. If the composers' egos would not allow their precious masterpiece to be altered then the producers should have scrapped the whole thing then and there. Doherty and McColgan are paying dearly for their lack of common sense.

I saw one of the first previews in Chicago, and this was all painfully obvious then. If anyone is curious, here is the review I posted Oct. 20th: https://forum.broadwayworld.com/readmessage.cfm?thread=914288&boardname=bway

edit: I couldn't resist copying the last paragraph from that October post here, I'm sorry to say that I predicted the outcome accurately.

"There is a hit musical ready to be born here, but this will require the producers to have the "balls" to go back to the drawing board and find a book writer and either an additional song writer or an entirely new composer who can do justice to this promising material. (I've heard that there are some talented writers in Ireland.) The alternative is to run PQ a few months on Broadway, lose countless millions of dollars and have people posting on boards like this in a few years "What ever happened to that Pirate Queen show?"

Updated On: 6/8/07 at 01:18 AM

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 1:22am

Tech, as for there being no audience for 80s sung through musicals, I think Les Mis and Phantom just run on their names.

Updated On: 6/8/07 at 01:22 AM

[CurtainPullDowner]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 1:33am

Think of what 16 or 18 million means to the producers of RIVERDANCE.
They obviously believed in this show and are devestated on how it worked out.
I'm sure it was an adventure for all involved.
And I wish them all the best for Living a Dream.

[Popular]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 1:57am

amalou - I'll keep this kind of short since it seems like you may have been turned off by this board and I don't know if you'll be back to even read this. Basically just wanted to say that this show has been through it and back a few times on this board and everywhere else. If the cast has been following the boards I'm sure that by now they're tough enough to dismiss the insensitivity. At least I hope that they would be. Don't worry too much about them and don't let the jerks get a rise out of YOU I'm sorry your introduction to posting on the boards has been so ugly, there ARE nice people here who know how to TACTFULLY state their distaste for something.

[fengshuihellnyc]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 2:06am

Reidel is an egotistical self centric bottom feeder that likes to call himself a reporter. Truth is he causes negativity in a world where there is too much as there is. He works for a Tabloid Paper... most likely due to the nature of his so called reporting. A paper that unfortunately many in NYC read due to the nature that its 25 cents or 50 cents compared to the cost of the NY times which is a genuine Paper of reporting. Most of the reporting in such tabloid is misleading or perhaps true and not meant for public ears. He is a rumor mill. He may many times perhaps be correct about certain aspects of information he writes in his column... However that does not make him Correct in Sharing that information.
I Personally did not like the Pirate Queen. Though I did believe many of the people in the show are wonderful performers. If I had to choose a steaming pile of PQ or a FLAMING pile of Reidel... I most definately would choose PQ any day.

[wonderfulwizard11]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 2:07am

Regardless of what you think of Riedel, as many have said, he is right a lot of the time.

And I don't know why you would take offense at this article. As I said, it was pretty evident this was a big flop.

[fengshuihellnyc]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 2:11am

PS.... Anyone who really wants to see what a waste of Flesh Reidel is should go and see the film SHOW BUSINESS (sp its late is that spelled right LOL).

[B3TA07]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 3:25am

idk LOL sp is so hard late @ nite

[TechEverlasting]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 8:06am

"I think Les Mis and Phantom just run on their names."

I disagree. The books and scores for Les Mis and Phantom get right everything that the Pirate Queen so miserably failed at. The characters and their story arcs are compelling, the songs add depth to the stories and the shows have interesting beginnings, middles and endings.

Here's another way to look at this question. If we could go back in time and have this exact production of The Pirate Queen open at the Imperial theater in 1987 do you think it would have been a hit then? If Les Mis had been brought into the Hilton for the first time this past March do you think it would have been a monumental, resounding flop?

[erinrebecca]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 8:34am

caitie,

Taking glee in the demise of a show is not only sad, it's stupid. You're obviously a fan of theatre if you frequent these forums so why on earth would you 'take glee' in the fact that these producers have lost $18 million on a project? How soon do you think they're going to be willing, or able, to inject that kind of $$ into a production again? I certainly hope you don't have aspirations of being an actor. If you do, you need to educate yourself to the reality of the business.

Even if you don't care about the producers (which would be ridiculous in itself), think of the number of individuals who worked on this production for however many years it's been in the works, and how many of them will be unemployed as of June 17.

You may have hated the show (did you even see it?) and everyone is certainly entitled to their opinion, but to 'take glee' in the fact that it failed is a ridiculous thing to say.

[orangeskittles]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 9:07am

$18 Million? Wow and I thought their investment was $16 million.
Yup, and I remember some Pirate Queen fan telling you that was wrong, in some attempt to deny their obvious demise. Chitty's investment was $14 million.

I certainly hope you don't have aspirations of being an actor.
Not since caitie got rejected from every theatre program she applied to.

I guess if she's being a blatant bitch, we can be too.

Updated On: 6/8/07 at 09:07 AM

[songanddanceman2]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 9:56am

As many know i have not been a fan of the Pirate Queen i thought it was an awful show what managed to put every step wrong except for some great performances(wooh wooh Stephanie) But i would never wish a show would close.

I have to say though when a show closes early like the pirate queen i can't say it doesnt make me laugh a little and here's why(before you all jump on me)

Normally when a show closes its a sad day especially when it happens to be a great show what just didn't catch on for one reason or another.
With shows like the Pirate Queen though i cant help thinking "well it serves the producers right" because this show should have closed out of town, i mean what were they thinking??

With pretty bad out of town reviews they should have sat up and paid attention but they didn't, as Tech said they just threw in a new song a bit more dancing and presented it on the toughest theatre markets in the world and hoped no one would notice it's flaws.

The producers of the PQ hoped the names of the people involved and the fact they wrote Miss Saigon and Les Mis would get people in to the theatre.
If they are good producers they should know that bad word of mouth can kill a show just as quick as bad reviews(and they got both).

They presented something rubbish on broadway after getting all the warning signs in Chicago and pretty much did nothing and still charged people to see this lumbering mess.

I always have huge respect for the producers and directors who hold there hands up out of town and say "sorry but this isn't ready for broadway" in other words we know we are going to flop and we don't want to charge people $100 for a show that isn't working.THAT'S THE RIGHT THING TO DO.

The pirate Queen had the warning signs and could have postponed or canceled a broadway run but didn't and it fell on its face.

Of course the cast and crew are another matter, all talented who just happened to end up in a mess of a show and they will all go on to do bigger and better things im sure and i wish them all the best in the world, plus there talents are better placed elsewhere than in a show like this, but the Producers should have known better.

This is just my opinion of course and i don't wish to upset the PQ fans .

[misschung]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 10:03am

Interesting about the issue of 80s musicals, and Les Mis and Phantom running on their names. I have to wonder how both of those shows would be received now for the first time.

[SorryGrateful]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 10:46am

amalou, suck it up. The problem with quite a few Pirate Queen fans on this board is that they take every remark about the show as a personal insult. I doubt that any of the cast got into theatre in general because it was such a respectful and cuddly place to work. I'm sure they're used to it, so you don't need to shelter them from all of we meanies with your body. Grow up.

"There is absolutely not ONE scrap of respect, decency or curtesy on this board."

I don't know. I think I may have thrown a curtsy or two around on these boards.

[TechEverlasting]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 11:34am

SorryGrateful, I for one have always appreciated your curtsies.

I think one reason that Pirate Queen fans take negative comments towards the show so personally is that the CastComs have created the illusion that all the people working on the show are their personal friends. In this regard I think CastCom have been enormously successful, although obviously this seemingly intimate relationship with fans wasn't enough to save the show.

It will be interesting to see if the "video-blog creator" becomes a standard component of the staffs of big musical productions in the future.

[me2]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 11:43am

I think this will have been good for Ms. Block. She got a lot of notice, and she even put some good words in for a run in the Broadway WICKED. She got a good pay check for a few months, and everyone loved her. It was just the show people didn't like.

I don't think people trashing shows on message boards are so bad because it has such a limited audience. But to do it in such a public forum as Reidel did . . . not cool.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 11:46am

I think my favorite quote was in EW, saying something to the effect of, 'This is what happens when Les Miserables and Riverdance throw up.'

[SorryGrateful]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 11:49am

Hmmmm, I hadn't thought of that, but I think you're entirely right, Tech. It's fun to really pull for a show, but when fans start to think that they're a vital part of it and the cast are all your own personal BFFs, that's just sad.

[Sally]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 2:26pm

___________________________________________________________________
Wasn't Dance of the Vampires the most expensive flop?
___________________________________________________________________

Supposedly, Dance of the Vampires lost over $12 million.

[amalou]

Posted: 6/8/07 at 8:25pm

Sorry for bugging people. I don't usually go on rants. No, I don't think the cast are my BFFs...though I do know someone personally in the ensemble, but that doesn't matter.

I was just upset and I know that it doesn't help to get emotional when I'm trying to articulate a good, insightful response. I'm not really a drama queen, I promise