HogansHero said: "@bear88,
I don't think the lesson is "Don't invest in crazy projects that challenge what people expect on Broadway." I think it is don't invest in projects that are not well thought out. Hamilton was a crazy project that challenged what people expect on Broadway. So was DEH, Fun Home etc etc. And for each of those shows, there were sizable threads on here explaining to everyone why those shows were crazy ideas. But they weren't. Because they were well thought out. It is not some newfangled notion that Comet made no sense as it was being produced. I and quite a few others said that pretty much from day one, and for my part I very much liked the show downtown so I had nothing against the material.
The lesson here is the first one you mentioned. And you'll notice that it's a lesson most of the smart money figured out in advance.
So HogansHero, here's my question. The Kagans badly mishandled the Onaodowan/Patinkin situation, and came off looking disingenuous and dense in the process, so I'm easily persuaded that they did plenty of other stupid things in the months and years beforehand - the sort of mistakes that rich, enthusiastic but inexperienced producers are certainly more likely to make.
But was the first mistake trying to turn Great Comet into a big, expensive Broadway show in the first place? Was this show doomed from the start? Would a shrewd producer have been able to make it a financially viable musical, or would a shrewd producer passed on the project, especially such a lavish project?
You correctly point out that other productions that might have seemed crazy turned into successes, or in the case of Hamilton, a money-printing machine. But the analogies you mention don't seem quite right. Fun Home had a natural Broadway audience, at least, and a small cast of nobodies. Dear Evan Hansen also had a small cast of nobodies, with the minor exception of Ben Platt, who wasn't really a star until the musical. Come From Away, same thing. All of those shows had much greater margins for error because of lower costs and no dependence on stars.
I don't know about Hamilton's costs, but it didn't really have stars either and had to have been one of the most shrewdly marketed shows in Broadway history. And regardless, only a complete fool would count on their show becoming a Hamilton-style phenomenon.
Comet is, as Malloy himself wrote, a "weird show" that wasn't going to appeal to everyone. The producers and creators seemed aware of this, and they brought in Josh Groban to try to address that problem. But they knew from the start that Groban was only going to be around until early July. They knew months before the Tonys that they weren't going to win the only award that counted, Best Musical. The producers knew their costs and temporarily pushed out Brittain Ashford in favor of Ingrid Michaelson to boost the box office after Groban left. They only hired Onaodowan as Pierre for a couple of months, leaving everyone with the impression there was some sort of plan to hire a star for the fall.
I'm curious about the obvious miscalculations here - not necessarily the ones I'm mentioning - that set up the show to fail, long before the current crisis.
