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Post by ellie1981 on Feb 1, 2018 14:42:41 GMT
The difference with a concert is that the opportunity to see a band/singer live, isnt all that often, its probably every few years. It really is an event. With Hamilton you can go anytime you like for many years to come. Personally i'd still pay more for theatre than a concwert, but thats just my preference i was certainly spoiled with the artists I loved growing up. I saw Prince many many times and never paid more than £40. The final time I saw him in 2014 the ticket was £10 and I was stood right beneath his feet. I saw Michael Jackson for £26 too (before the likes of Rolling Stones, U2 and Madonna lead the way with premium prices). Grew up loving Kylie and it wasn’t until 2011 that her ticket prices started exceeding the £50 mark. The price of a big concert for an established Pop/Rock act is simply based on greed.
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Post by ellie1981 on Feb 1, 2018 13:15:44 GMT
I actually think the news reports over ticket prices and demand are possibly keeping certain people away from even trying for tickets. For a show that is supposed to be a bit of a game changer, I’ve seen criticism that for a show with a cast recording appealing to masses, the pricing is allegedly keeping them away.
I’ve found that there’s a kind of reverse snobbery against theatre goers, assuming we’re all wealthy uppity folks purely through mis-information. I mean yes, I have a disposable income and live in London which allows for comfortable access, but I find it ridiculous when I see certain assumptions aimed at the theatre going community. I don’t earn a particularly high wage, but having no debt is the fundamental reason.
Case in point, a couple of years ago I saw a Bruce Springsteen at Wembley in a group of 6. The tickets cost £160 each to be sat at the back of the stadium with The Boss as nothing but a dot on a screen. 3 of the party spent an absolute fortune at the bar that night in addition to the ticket. Some of them are now considering seeing U2 who last time I looked were charging £200 for a regular ticket all the way up to £500 for their arena dates. But apparently theatre and Hamilton in particular is only for the rich.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 31, 2018 20:59:42 GMT
People are throwing shade at a 200 and 250 pound ticket and of course those prices are insane, but if you went for a nice dinner with drinks, dessert and perhaps went to a bar with friends after, you could easily drop 200 quid in a night...it's all about priorities. Those buying these tickets won't be passing on their swanky dinners beforehand or drinks, add them on to the price of a ticket and, by your reasoning, that's five hundred pounds gone right away. For a large percentage of the population, this kind of money is as far away from being thought of as small change as can ever be. It's a big % of our monthly wage. But all is OK because they have left a handful of tickets for ten pounds each performance for us to fight over... That reminds me (on a much smaller scale) of the arguments people make against going to the cinema. I go all the time through an Unlimited card, and even without that there are good deals and schemes around everywhere so you don’t need to spend £12 to £15 for an adult ticket. All I hear is “oh but then you’ve got to get popcorn and drinks and they’re so overpriced etc.”. Yeah, they are but no one is forcing you to buy them and it’s not going to kill you to go for a couple of hours without snacking. If you want to just see a film then just see it and go home. If you really really want to see a show and the tickets are just within your price range, then see it, skip the meal and drinks and save them for another time. This is of course for those without kids who may expect that kind of thing. Does that sound boring? I do go out for a meal and drinks before theatre on some occasions when it’s a pre-planned group thing, just not every occasion. When I hear people say these things of whom I know are in the same financial and social situation, I just think they’re making excuses.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 30, 2018 23:50:06 GMT
If anything, I brag about the bargains I get at the theatre from last minute deals rather than the embarrassing times I’ve spent more than I should on an impulse - that’s when I keep it quiet so people don’t think I’m completely mad.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 21:44:04 GMT
I do spend a lot on theatre (although mostly try to get the best bargains I can for most shows), but combine what a lot of other people might spend on drinking, football/sporting events, gym memberships combined - not to mention on top of that I don't have any student debts, car payments or children, the odd overpriced ticket pales in comparison.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 20:20:52 GMT
Fair point. But I'd rather just TodayTix rush for, for example, 42nd Street and pay £25 for a front-centre Stalls seat than sit in the gods for less £40 when I have hesr mixed things about the sound and stuff up there anyway. No wonder I've seen 42nd Street 6 times! You can do this for Hamilton though. They have £10 lottery seats, albeit difficult to get hold of. I should imagine the £40 seats at 42nd Street are also up with the gods I got Rush seats at the front side of the Dress Circle for £25 for 42nd Street once, so it's not always front stalls.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 20:04:21 GMT
Even Harry Potter doesn't charge that much. And in theory it should be more than Hamilton because it is two plays. Its a shame, because some of the cast are so great and I'm sure are great in the show, but the prices being this extreme, its puts me off going even more now. Because its just feeding ego and gives other producers basically permission to charge this for their shows, and I don't wanna support that. Let other people be the idiots and pay those prices, fine by me, but I'm good. No-one's forcing you to pay the high prices - you could still buy a cheaper ticket if you wanted to go! All my visits that are booked are costing me less than £40 each... This would never happen, but I'd love for there to be at least one date to be sold out in the Grand Circle and not have sold any seats elsewhere until they have to sell them all on the day for £40.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 14:20:43 GMT
No more front row stalls at £37.50.... Holding them for lottery going forward? I’m sill wondering what happened to the planned weekly lottery for £37.50 seats. It was announced but nothing came of it.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 13:18:58 GMT
Really quite awful ticket price increases on this one. It's really unfortunate that the money-grabbing attitude has won out here- it's going to make a ridiculous profit anyway, Cam Mac could at least try and keep some of the tickets accessible. None of that is doing the 'theatre is only for the well off not normal folks'idea any favours. £100 for all (nearly all?) circle seats. Are you kidding? I agree. And this show in particular is one I would for my non theatre friends to see, particularly one who has never been before but his main interests are Politics and Hip Hop music, but he’d never spend that much.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 13:03:13 GMT
Well, that was stressful. Ticketmaster UK doesn't give as much time per page as Ticketmaster US. I had to race the clock a couple times -- getting new password, credit card not working, etc. -- and literally clicked on the "Continue" button with 1 second remaining. Twice. But, all is well. Got my ticket for mid-September. Having dutifully checked the Monkey beforehand, I was aiming for central Stalls Row D -- but those seats weren't even offered (I got the map). Ended up with F35 for £100. As the £200 Premium price began the next seat over, I'm good. It was very odd because usually as soon as you confirm that you want the seat selection, when it goes to payment stage you would get 10 minutes or so, but this time each stage for me had about 90 seconds.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 12:59:07 GMT
I would love to know when cast change will be, but I expect we won't know until later in the year. The closest Saturday to the start of previews will be 1 Dec, but given for the replacement cast auditions the ad said contracts starting in October I suspect cast change will be some time in mid to late November. Depends how much time the new cast need to rehearse - does anyone know how long they get on Broadway? I *believe* the first performance of the new cast is scheduled to be 26th November 2018, with rehearsals starting on/around 8th October 2018! Oh fantastic. Yes, I said I wouldn’t just an hour ago but still did a random search for my birthday which is a Monday in December, so thought why not? Got Stalls Row F for £100 each, but I wasn’t frantically searching and wouldn’t have been too devastated if nothing came up. I was hoping for a box but the Select My Seats option was not working after selection.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 29, 2018 10:52:53 GMT
I don’t think I’m going to bother with the second booking period clamour today. I’ll have seen it six times by the end of the first period. I’m running out of friends to take who will actually chip in for the price of their ticket and am sick of being the one responsible for ticket booking.
I’m sure in the future the last minute returns method for getting seats will be just as simple. Seeing the next Saturday matinee this week by myself where I got a £37.50 front centre stalls ticket a few weeks ago, which will be my first since the previews.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 25, 2018 0:08:17 GMT
I saw this tonight with the wonderful singer/actress playing Ella Fitzgerald. What a voice!
I have no idea who the cast were but unfortunately was not too impressed with the Sammy Davis Jr. They got a decent lookalike, but he didn’t sound anything like him plus really couldn’t dance much. When he has one comedy dance duet with Dean Martin and he outshines Sammy, there’s a bit of a problem, particularly when there’s footage of a dying SDJ in the late 80s having more spring in his step even then.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 17, 2018 23:29:58 GMT
Saw this tonight and Meera was just fantastic. I was a huge fan of the 1982 film growing up (less so the 2014 remake which is one of the few films I've ever walked out of) but have never seen it on stage. I can't imagine Miranda or Craig Revel Horwood doing even remotely as good of a job as Meera did with the whole performance. She was also the highlight of Romeo & Juliet a couple of years ago.
Some of the girls were just so young, I couldn't believe how well they did. I wish I;d seen it when I was younger though because it's very much a kid's show.
Was not impressed by the organisation of the theatre however. I got there at 18:00 to pick up the tickets before going for something to eat. I queued for 10 minutes as they hadn't got the collection tickets ready and there were a good 20 people waiting. Got back to the theatre at 19:10 and waited outside with hundreds of people until 19:20 before they started letting us in. The show started a bit late because of this. I was at the back of the stalls so right near the exit - When it was over, the staff still took a good couple of minutes to even let us out, being more concerned with directing people to the toilets than the exit.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 16, 2018 18:46:55 GMT
I met Sheridan Smith several times in a pub over a space of a few weeks - the rehearsal space for a show she was doing was opposite our regular after work haunt. She was absolutely lovely, especially when some of my party (complete strangers to theatre) started bugging her just because they’d seen her on TV.
Martin Ball has always been extremely nice at the stage door, but I haven’t done any hanging around at a stage door for about 10 years now.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 16, 2018 18:41:53 GMT
I’m just wondering why people are still listing tickets on Viagogo in the first place. The other day I passed one of those ‘Half Price Tickets’ booths (the fake ones dotted around Leicester Square that aren’t TKTS. They even had Hamilton listed on their advertisements outside. I really wonder what their game is.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 13, 2018 22:56:07 GMT
I know some of the glowstick gang so....no comment, haha. What did dayseaters do in the early days? I've heard something about people turning up later and joining their friends in the queue? It was just very respectful and good fun. We’d turn up as early as possible and keep to the rules. I did it with a good friend and we’d never queue jump. Maybe one of us would come later to keep the other company but it didn’t matter as we only wanted two tickets anyway. Miriam Margolyes would sometimes come out for a chat. I’d feel a bit too old for it now.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 13, 2018 0:42:36 GMT
That sounds terrible. I was one of the crazy dayseater fans in 2006, particularly during those initial 12 weeks with Idina, but never would have done anything like that to disturb anyone. I see Wicked perhaps once a year now or less. Who are these people and do you think they’ve been doing this for long? Doubt I could have kept it up for 12 years.
One of the more recent times I went a couple of years ago I was dismayed to see it had turned into a cinema atmosphere. I had top price seats in the stalls as was taking a friend who had not seen it, and was extremely disheartened to find people using their phones during the show, and one whole family together scoffing popcorn and chatting to each other throughout.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 12, 2018 19:44:43 GMT
Seeing Hamilton in a few months time with an American acquaintance. Problem is I know nothing about it and have never listened to any of the songs. I'm only going because my friend knows the lyrics to every song back to front and is obsessed with it. Do I need to do my research beforehand and listen to the soundtrack or can I go into it completely blind? I don't want to waste £60 on something I absolutely hated. We went last month and saw it totally 'blind' and with a completely open mind. It was very enjoyable but obvious that we missed quite a lot of the details and I doubt many would catch absolutely every word or nuance first time. We've booked again for a later show but I realise that will be down to pocket and convenience to suggest you do that. I do feel that it's slightly different, in that Lin Manuel Miranda wrote a lot of it as a concept album. He even said he wrote it like he sees some of his favourite Hip Hop albums, so that with every listen there's something picked up that you never noticed before. So in that respect it's not like most other musicals.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 12, 2018 12:40:32 GMT
I’m so worried about these tight seats you all talk about in the circles now. I should be OK as am 5’5”, but my mother is 5’10” and cramps in her knees if in the same position for too long. Especially after since seeing that bright red line for Royal Circle Row A on TM’s website.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 11, 2018 22:27:00 GMT
Tonight's show was a psychic horror "Read My Mind" set in a crumbling library. I never knew Henry S, playing a child with telekinetic powers, could look so disturbingly weird! Also had Dave as a psychopathic serial stabber, so it was quite dark in places tonight. As I was leaving I saw a girl who couldn't have been more than about 7 or 8 so goodness knows what she made of it. I do wish parents would read age advice, it's 12+ for this show. Just because the Goes Wrong shows are suitable for all ages it doesn't mean all Mischief's output is. Comedic highlights included the line dancing in a German expressionist nightclub led by Charlie, Dave & Laura's "levels" scene, & Harry accidentally hitting his glasses off his face into the audience (which got a rewind)! Only 1 song "We've Got So Much In Common" but it did get a rather sinister reprise later. The first time round it was a love duet between Charlie & Harry's characters but it was slightly difficult not to be distracted by the pelvic thrusting dancing Josh & Dave were doing in the background! This was my first and only time seeing this tonight. Absolutely loved it. Henry S as the creepy kid Timmy had me in fits, as well as the rewinds - the "recruitment of books" deleted scene and the dad pretending to be in a coma so his daughter could learn about her powers on her own.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 10, 2018 15:39:28 GMT
Ross is leaving soon? Oh no, I generally wanted to see this mainly for him. As usual my FAFFING friends decided other things were more important and booked for the first week of March - it would have been Summer if I had not been bugging them, knowing Noble would be doing his stand up tours soon.
They always tease me about my general sense of urgency to do certain things in a certain window of time, and unfortunately I’m generally right but they never listen.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 10, 2018 14:39:20 GMT
It doesn’t have to be a different TM account as far as I’ve found. You just can’t have more than one open booking on the same credit card - I tried on my main card with my first original booking that only has 3 seats and it just won’t allow it. Then I’ve used my other card twice in succession when I went in December plus another future booking. However I currently have two open bookings on my debit card. I have two open bookings on one credit card so it's not impossible. I know they have cancelled bookings when people went over the 6 tickets per booking period on Broadway. But no idea how/if they keep track of the whole thing for the London production. That’s so strange. I wonder why it’s not letting any of my credit cards be used twice then. I sincerely hope none of mine are cancelled. I’m taking different people each time. Unfortunately I am usually the “ticket booker” amongst my friends and family as they just don’t have the patience with websites. They also tend to faff around and lose their bookings because they take so long.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 10, 2018 12:56:57 GMT
Alright so... stupidly maxed out my six ticket limit by buying for my family last year and I want to buy one extra ticket for a night I’m seeing Hamilton for a friend as a present. I know the website recommends giving them the money for the ticket blah blah blah but I don’t want to do that for various reasons and so have purposefully scoped out a spare seat on the night I’m going. Has anyone bought additional tickets using different cards etc? What are they using to keep track of who’s buying? Any thoughts/ideas? linked to a card and Ticketmaster account as far as I'm aware. Different card on different account should be fine. It doesn’t have to be a different TM account as far as I’ve found. You just can’t have more than one open booking on the same credit card - I tried on my main card with my first original booking that only has 3 seats and it just won’t allow it. Then I’ve used my other card twice in succession when I went in December plus another future booking. However I currently have two open bookings on my debit card.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 10, 2018 10:34:38 GMT
This would have been far better for the Phoenix Theatre rather than yet another Chicago revival. Phoenix is too small unless they massively scale the show back. Really? It’s larger than The Old Vic. I’d have thought it was the perfect size.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 9, 2018 19:11:27 GMT
Oh wow, the article describes his anger worse than I expected.
I've never seen Thriller Live and will never see it. I remember when Adrian Grant was touting it around years and years ago and only the Michael Jackson fan community really knew about it - probably close to 2003/04. It sounded awful even then and no better than some of those dreadful impersonators. I'm such a huge fan, yes I was part of those crazy mobs you'd see on TV. I've seen tribute acts to a lot of my favourite singers and bands and MJ is really the only one that nobody can even remotely pin down, so a stage musical tribute seems like the worst idea. I wouldn't be able to si through it either.
I was once intrigued but maybe the week before MJ died, a friend and I went to West End Live and saw their performance. My friend could dance and do those moves better than they could (she is a performer but has never really made it her focus).
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 9, 2018 16:39:45 GMT
This would have been far better for the Phoenix Theatre rather than yet another Chicago revival.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 9, 2018 15:45:46 GMT
I saw the final dress rehearsal of this (after the initial previews were cancelled) at The Old Vic and really do hope it comes back. It was so special. I took my mum and she still can’t stop raving about it and wants to see it again.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 7, 2018 1:56:47 GMT
I certainly don’t remember learning anything about the Boston Tea Party. The only American History we learned in school was about slavery which wasn’t exclusive to America. In fact we did very little outside of centuries old British history. It was a thrill the one time when we did South Africa and Apartheid because it was something from within our own lifetime.
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Post by ellie1981 on Jan 6, 2018 12:57:20 GMT
I think a decent few post do highlight the requirement for a greater number of relaxed performances. They are still a rarity in the West End and I think shows running a certain length should be required to do them at least yearly. Publicly funded shows should definitely be scheduling them too. They are preferred by everyone. People with difficulties (and their carers) know they can make noise etc without people minding, the cast know what to expect and so aren't put off, and the audiences of the other performances can be free of distractions (which theatre has so much of already) that might hamper their enjoyment of the show. I've done several relaxed performances and they've been a great experience. Obviously disability is a difficult subject but no one wants people who already have a hard enough time as it is being restricted from enjoying live theatre so pushing for an increase in relaxed performances would make everyone happier. Except maybe the accountants as the performances inevitably sell fewer tickets hence why I push them on long runners and publicly funded shows who can afford them. Defiantly! and relaxed performances make it possible for those who couldn't come at all to a "normal" performance possible (as in those with sensory difficulties, those with issues around crowds etc.) it's a wonderful thing that more theatres- especially those with the resources to do so- should be insisting upon. But obviously also we should be careful not to corral all disabled people into the 'you must attend only your designated perfomances' as well- not least because they're so few and far between. Just as a whole- in theatre and beyond- we need to keep thinking and rethinking how we make society more accessible for everyone so we're all on as equal a playing field as possible. I was talking to my boss the other week about all the theatre I see and he said how he'd like to go some day. When I asked why he didn't, it completely slipped my mind about his condition. He's epileptic and has mini fits several times a day which involve about 10-20 seconds of him making some rather strange high pitched sounds. He said he'd just need to be guaranteed a seat on the aisle at the back so he could slip out at a moments notice. I;m sure he could arrange a position like that easily but unfortunately he's too self conscious about it to try.
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