Update: AIN'T NO MO extended thru December 23! Yay! — Page 2

Jordan Catalano said: "lily carver said: "I was there tonight and Mr. Cooper made an impassioned speech partly attacking Broadway for not being more open to plays like his.He kept saying Broadway has to change.”


Yes. Attack Broadway for people not wanting to see your show. That’s exactly what’s needed. Not promotion or trying to sell your show but attacks on the community thats actually putting your show on. Makes perfect sense.

"

There is no "community" putting this show on. There are producers putting on a show in an effort to either make money or in rare cases because they're altruistic and believe it needs to be there. The idea of Broadway being some loving community and not a business is exactly what leads us to delusional ideas like "KPOP is closing because of one bad review from the Times"

The only real "community that supports a show" = 8,000 people buying tickets at $100+ each for a sustained period of time.

I just came into New York and saw seven shows. This show appeals to me but nothing about the marketing or presentation of this production made it more important than the shows that we ended up slotting into our trip. The show had no stars, no performers I particularly love, the production didn't seem particularly spectacular, and while the ensemble was praised there wasn't a performance put forward as unmissable. I'm really looking forward to seeing this play for $50 at a regional theater here in Chicago, whenever it gets here. Nothing about the Broadway production felt like an event.

This production might have had some or all of those things...but the marketing and press didn't clue me into that. I REALLY am looking forward to experiencing the play... it just didn't feel like there was a reason to see it on Broadway at Broadway prices.

New shows doing well: “A Beautiful Noise” & “Leo…” (can’t spell it). Broadway is super white.

Broadway marketing is incredibly up to date. The vast majority of spending is on social media (including influencers) and digital research. The marketing agencies are able to target anyone who has shown any interest in a play, or even googled the style of music, an actor, or anything related to the show.

As I said on another thread the problem with both KPOP and ANM was the same problem that literally every new musical has, they were good, but not good enough.

Yes, there are economic headwinds, covid fears and 15% fewer tourists in the city. And yes, Broadway has just begun to seriously court non-white, non-traditional audiences, but there were serious flaws with just about every new show.

Almost Famous, A Beautiful Noise and Some Like It Hot were old school shows that didn't make a dent beyond their target audiences. I haven't seen Kimberly Akimbo, but & Juliet was fun, but fluff, and A Strange Loop, ANM and KPOP, were notable that they came from non-Broadway-traditional creators, but neither the books nor the music were remarkable. All of these shows have their die-hard supporters, so I completely understand if you loved one of them, but none generated the necessary enthusiasm from the average theater goer.

So IMO this isn't about white people not getting it, or Broadway not knowing how to market their shows - the problem was that this years crop of new musicals weren't good enough.

Updated On: 12/10/22 at 08:38 AM

songanddanceman2 said: "I might get shouted at for this but I don't care.

Message plays, plays lecturing people on how to be and how to see the world etc are not what people are after right now. The world has been through HELL for years now, yet the moment theatres can open, each new play seems to be yet another 'message" play

Shows like Six, &Juliet, Moulin Rouge etc are doing well because it offers something fun, simple, a place to escape the non stop barrage of mess in the outside world, people do not want to walk in to the same thing.

Plays need to adapt, of course we need still the kind of plays we are seeing, but we also need something different. More comedies, thrillers etc, something that reaches a mainstream audience.

Producers need to read the room."

I couldn’t agree more with this whole post!!!

SouthernCakes said: "New shows doing well: “A Beautiful Noise” & “Leo…” (can’t spell it). Broadway is super white."

Would love to learn more about how Leopoldstadt is a “white” show. Please enlighten me.

I disagree that marketing is up-to-date. Having a social media presence doesn’t mean you know how to use it or reach target audiences. It doesn’t mean you know how to create the correct content that will get audiences excited about seeing your show. I got a mailer for this play that said they couldn’t even say what the play is about until you open the mailer. How is that good marketing?

I think shows are behind in reaching their target communities, appealing to broader audiences, etc. A show doesn’t have to be good to garner excitement (and we’ve seen that with other shows in recent years). The “good but not good enough” argument hasn’t stopped shows from becoming massive hits. Some of those are still playing to sold-out houses on Broadway. Even bad shows can have terrific marketing. When people say the system is broken etc., marketing is one of things that hasn’t been fixed and hasn’t reached out to potentially new and younger audiences. I’ve seen multiple companies of shows over the past few years do more outreach to underrepresented communities and younger crowds than the shows’ marketing teams. I think it’s fair to say that the same marketing strategies don’t work for every show, and the ones that are failing are a certain type of show that hasn’t had good marketing.

As someone who works in advertising for this industry - it is an uphill battle to evolve advertising due to a number of factors, many of which are financial and how the mainstay producers view the value of how their dollars are spent. Most digital/online advertising has an actual quantifiable ROI, but they'd rather spend $ on an ad in the New York Times for zero measurable ROI and far fewer impressions per dollar for a number of reasons that may make sense to them and not to others. I genuinely believe that until there's a new crop of producers - they're coming, but slowly - there won't be a true evolution/modernization of Broadway advertising, which is what these "non-traditional" audience shows need.

Updated On: 12/10/22 at 11:36 AM

ElephantLoveMedley said: "SouthernCakes said: "New shows doing well: “A Beautiful Noise” & “Leo…” (can’t spell it). Broadway is super white."

Would love to learn more about how Leopoldstadt is a “white” show. Please enlighten me."

Look at the audience?

Those three shows you mentioned are revivals of established titles starring celebrities.

newyorker1410 said: "Broadway marketing is incredibly up to date. The vast majority of spending is on social media (including influencers) and digital research. The marketing agencies are able to target anyone who has shown any interest in a play, or even googled the style of music, an actor, or anything related to the show.

As I said on another thread the problem with both KPOP and ANM was the same problem that literally every new musical has, they were good, but not good enough.

Yes, there are economic headwinds, covid fears and 15% fewer tourists in the city. And yes, Broadway has just begun to seriously court non-white, non-traditional audiences, but there were serious flaws with just about every new show.

Almost Famous, A Beautiful Noise and Some Like It Hot were old school shows that didn't make a dent beyond their target audiences. I haven't seen Kimberly Akimbo, but & Juliet was fun, but fluff, and A Strange Loop, ANM and KPOP, were notable that they came from non-Broadway-traditional creators, but neither the books nor the music were remarkable. All of these shows have their die-hard supporters, so I completely understand if you loved one of them, but none generated the necessary enthusiasm from the average theater goer.

So IMO this isn't about white people not getting it, or Broadway not knowing how to market their shows - the problem was that this years crop of new musicals weren't good enough."

That opening sentence of your post is so laughable but it pretty much discredits what follows in advance. (I won't repeat what Hey Mr Music says in their post.) A few quick comments though:

1. Lumping the two shows in the same pot qualitatively is not supportable. Look at the reviews.

2. It is remarkable what multiple posts in this thread think they know without seeing the show.

3. When you start talking about serious flaws, you are talking at the margins and in generalities. A number of these shows have exceptionally strong reviews. (Obviously not all.) So when people say something to the contrary, they have either substituted personal opinion for objective analysis or they are speaking anecdotally based on personal opinions they have heard from others (or concluded based on nothing).

4. The marketing problem is not unidirectional. There are serious problems with marketing to non-traditional audiences but there is also terrible problem with the marketing to mainstream audiences not all of which are disinterested in shows involving ethnicities other than their own (as some here seem to be) or that address real and challenging issues rather than merely offering fluff.

5. It's easy, and natural tbh, to commence the blame game at points like this. Yes, there is a lot of blame to go around but we get posts like "The show was not marketed well because Daniels is a first time producer." I guess it's not surprising that someone decides to blame the black guy but the fact is, this show had seasoned (white) producers and general management (with the same pedigree, as it happens, as KPOP), and I would say Daniels did as all smart tyro producers do and engaged people from within the existing infrastructure who then engaged other people from within. The fault, I would say, emanates from therein. We have to face the fact that the established players (contrary to that laughable opening statement) are inept when it comes to marketing for an audience beyond the well-paved paths they have always followed.

Updated On: 12/10/22 at 01:29 PM