how much longer can menagerie last?

[apdarcey]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:48pm

with an attendance percentage of only 43% this week (and around that or lower every other week), and josh lucas leaving the production, how can the show really stay on the boards? christian and jessica and sarah should just pack it up and call it quits. the wingfield family needs to accept their defeat.

[WiCkEDrOcKS]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:49pm

I give it a month at the most. My question is (and it can stay as long as is permitted as I thought it was a wonderful revival) how long can Steel Magnolias last?

[bunchamuncha]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:51pm

well it closes july 17th.
and it needs to hang on until then b/c I have tix for that show.

[umgeoboy]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:51pm

We could pretty much go down the list of play revivals not doing great. Even Wolf is only at 50% and has been there most of its run. Glenngarry is an exception that is more secure in the 70's.

[Madame X]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:51pm

It's a limited run through 7/17 so I assume they can make it to then.

beat again

Updated On: 6/14/05 at 01:51 PM

[apdarcey]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:51pm

or on golden pond, which i thought was very good in its own right.

[apdarcey]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 1:52pm

ah, i forgot it was a limited run. thanks guys.

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 2:16pm

People, plays don't fill the theaters. Even Denzel's Julius Caesar still had Orchestra center seats available on the final day. The producers expect this, and it costs a heck of a lot less to keep a play running than a musical.

[bunchamuncha]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 2:19pm

Tell that to Doubt!

Denzel didn't fill audience b/c his reviews were terrible. I think we live in a day and age where people go to shows based more on reviews than on sheer merit of seeing a show.

And doesn't it cost less to run a play because there's no orchestra, heck of a lot less stagehands and sets are usually less elaborate?

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 2:27pm

But Denzel DID fill the audience and the show was a major financial hit. Check the numbers.

Reviews had NOTHING to do with how well Julius Caesar did. It was completely and totally critic proof because of Washington's name above the title. It recouped its investment in less than two months and typically posted attendance figures in the mid-to-upper 90s.

Last week (the final one of the run), attendance was at 101.1% (and at 99% the week before). That's with bad reviews and no discounts. Talk about star power.

[Wanna Be A Foster]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 2:33pm

Well Doubt just won 4 Tony Awards including Best Play, I think it has a slight advantage. I'm talking about just run of the mill plays, like Steel Magnolias, that had pretty much solid reviews, has a stellar cast and well-known story.

Updated On: 6/14/05 at 02:33 PM

[WOSQ]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 4:27pm

I don't know why some plays are revived. There was no cry for a new Broadway production of Steel Magnolias. It is entertaining, but a 80-90 bucks a pop, entertaining might not be enough. (The same was true of La Cage. No one was writing, "Gee, it would be great to see that again.")

On paper the production of The Glass Menagerie looked promising without remembering that the star's previous NY outing was not the splendid smash they had hoped for. Forget the artistic decisions that did not do the play justice. I have recommended this production to acting students to see as a group and then to discuss what went wrong.

Glengarry is what happens when the stars come together in near perfect alignment (Never mind that I don't like the play.) Here was a play that name actors were willing to commit to for 6 months, one of them a major tv star, plus a star director. This production is more of a hit than the original.

The writing about Caesar was right on the money. A big star who people wanted to see and the show was a major financial success and critic-proof. Smart producing if artistically lacking.

12 Angry Men is the anomaly. It is the first genuine sleeper to come in under the radar in years and be the hit that it was. Part of it was that in spite of the large cast, it was cheap to run. Word of mouth was good from the first preview and kept it running.

Virginia Woolf has always been a tough sell. Even the ground breaking original while a hit and ran for 18 months, was never really a smash. Now that it is summer, it will even be a tougher sell since this is not the sort of play that average tourists are going to lap up. I wish it had come in earlier in the season to build a bigger word-of-mouth.

Golden Pond has a big star, a fairly big co-star, a recognizable title and the production is done not expensively. But again there was no cry to see this play. Still because of the low break even the show runs.

Revivals need to be done somewhat on the cheap because unless there is a radical rethinking of the show that works, maybe the audience just isn't that interested.

[melissa errico fan]

Posted: 6/14/05 at 6:49pm

I find it very funny that this revival didn't do very well on Broadway. Although I am no fan of the production, it is definitely not as bad as has been said in reviews and board statements. Had this production opened in London instead of New York, it would be the hottest ticket in town and run forever.