Why don’t Off Bway shows report their weekly grosses?

[abcd12]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 2:19pm

Random thought, but: is there any rhyme or reason to the fact that Off Broadway shows don’t historically publish their weekly grosses? 

Would be really interesting to see reporting where these shows are concerned. 

Updated On: 12/11/25 at 02:19 PM

[Kad]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 2:24pm

Off-Broadway is just a different beast. For one, there are substantially more shows and those shows often are very short runs. The bulk of Off-Broadway is also nonprofit theatre, where shows tend to be expected to run at a loss. 

[quizking101]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 2:45pm

Yeah. Kad nailed it. Even at the more “commercial” venues like New World Stages, it wouldn’t make sense.

I could just imagine if off-Broadway posted and people on this board would freak out if they saw that (example) HEATHERS grossed only $110,000 in a week and not recognizing that the theatre is 499 seats and budgeted much differently than Broadway.

[CoffeeBreak]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 2:46pm

Heathers will never make money off broadway.

[Smaxie]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 3:13pm

Except that Heathers is, and has been, making money since it started performances in June. It had the highest advance sales in New World history, and broke the house record multiple times. 

[ACL2006]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 4:29pm

Also, a lot of Off-Broadway shows don't do 8 shows a week. But I'd always been curious to see if a show like Perfect Crime gets even 100 people a week.

[raddersons]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 4:34pm

Correct me if I’m wrong, but the only reason we get Broadway grosses is because they report them to The Broadway League. I don’t think there is an Off-Broadway equivalent, nor do I think there’s any interest in putting one together. It’d be an additional regulatory task required by the producers that they frankly don’t have time or money for.

Updated On: 12/11/25 at 04:34 PM

[HogansHero]

Posted: 12/11/25 at 11:44pm

To add, while there is an off-Broadway league, its focus is more on publicity and labor than finance. As noted, most shows are not-for-profit, which would make such a report pretty meaningless. Likewise, many of the commercial off-B efforts are (also as noted) short runs and many use a different method of budgeting and capitalization. Raising money off-B is not usually on the same level: while both utilize similar vehicles, off-B does not really involve any sort of marketing for capital and that is ultimately a main reason why Broadway producers want to publicize their grosses. 

[Mary_Poppins]

Posted: 12/12/25 at 12:31am

Can you elaborate on that? I've always wondered why the League or individual shows have any interest to publish their numbers, especially when most of them do not recoup and they are usually reluctant to say much about the capitalization and running cost side of the equation.

[CoffeeBreak]

Posted: 12/12/25 at 1:59am

Smaxie said: "Except that Heathers is, and has been, making money since it started performances in June. It had the highest advance sales in New World history, and broke the house record multiple times."

It won't make its money back.  It's too expensive weekly with cast size to start.