Riedel on Investors demanding answers from The Great Comet — Page 4

@bear, you've put a lot of meat on the bones of what I was trying to say. Reflecting, there was a lot of square-peg-in-round-hole-ness involved. The target audience was not going to get the show, and those who get the show were going to be turned off by the series of mis-steps. I agree that they seemed to wake up to how to market the show around April, but by then it was too little too late. A lot of us saw a crisis before the first pierogi was cooked, but even as skeptical as I was, I would never have dreamed that Groban's full run would only translate into recouping 15%. That was a wow of epic proportions.

haterobics said: "Lucas Steele intimated that without Groban there was no chance of a Broadway run for Comet, though, so that sort of really changes the parameters of a discussion into how a Broadway show that never would have happened might have otherwise succeeded on Broadway?!"

What might have been has been rehearsed here ad infinitum, and though Lucas is a fine actor, I doubt he has any special insight along these lines. That said, I think it is fair to say that the Kagans might well not have proceeded without Groban. Once again we end up with a show of theirs that we can be glad we had a chance to see but that was an abject failure. After OTT, I had to question the sanity of anyone who invested but then I remember PT Barnum. One has to wonder how much more their ability to raise money has been damaged by this show, and especially the "audit." We shall see: I never underestimate.