501 posts
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Post by anthony on Sept 16, 2022 21:16:09 GMT
So the NY Times have confirmed it.
Final performance on 18th February 2023. Cast told earlier today. Shocking.
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Sept 16, 2022 21:24:19 GMT
If it's losing nearly $1m a month, its not that surprising. They'll get the Christmas holiday period and no doubt they'll add a lot of extra performances that week and maybe the closing announcement will cause a surge and they might cling on for a little while longer.
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501 posts
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Post by anthony on Sept 16, 2022 21:29:12 GMT
Confirmed on the official website now. Genuinely shocking.
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Post by mrbarnaby on Sept 16, 2022 21:40:52 GMT
Here’s hoping!
I bet CM is planning on closing Broadway and replacing with the terrible London version.
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Post by kyvai on Sept 16, 2022 22:32:30 GMT
Aaaarrrggghhhh!!! I’m just in the middle of planning a Broadway trip for next spring and was so looking forward to seeing this production. Bum. Not sure I can bring it forward enough to catch it now. Dammit.
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Post by showtoones on Sept 16, 2022 22:49:44 GMT
Here’s hoping! I bet CM is planning on closing Broadway and replacing with the terrible London version. I thought that too, but perhaps they would’ve announced that it was coming back in a new form? Or maybe they don’t want a tease it so that more people will pay to see this version before closes? Only time will tell…
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Sept 16, 2022 22:58:51 GMT
In London they tried to do it under the cover of covid but they wont get that on Broadway. I would imagine it will close and then go out on another US tour
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Post by sukhavati on Sept 16, 2022 23:13:33 GMT
Here’s hoping! I bet CM is planning on closing Broadway and replacing with the terrible London version. That's my first thought as well. There will be the whole song and dance that "due to popular demand" the show will instead go dark for awhile to reopen a "bigger and better" version, which will be rubbish.
Now I have to think hard about making another NY trip. I really don't want to be there in the winter, but one last chance to see the original production might be worth it.
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Post by carmella1 on Sept 16, 2022 23:46:04 GMT
Maybe he wants the theatre for Bad Cinderella which will close immediately.
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Post by mattnyc on Sept 17, 2022 1:27:31 GMT
I can’t imagine what the city will be like without Phantom. It’s been this theatrical constant for most of my life and is pretty much our Broadway mascot. It’s going to be so odd to walk down the street and not have that mask on a marquee and all the poles.
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6,363 posts
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Post by Jon on Sept 17, 2022 1:36:36 GMT
I wonder who made the decision, RUG or the Shuberts? I am surprised they’re closing it rather than just downsizing and moving it to a smaller theatre.
I don’t see it closing in London just yet though although it would nice to see a new show at Her/His Majesty’s Theatre
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Post by spathzthecat on Sept 17, 2022 1:36:36 GMT
What's the next show to close in NY or in the UK?
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Post by chernjam on Sept 17, 2022 1:41:34 GMT
I can’t imagine what the city will be like without Phantom. It’s been this theatrical constant for most of my life and is pretty much our Broadway mascot. It’s going to be so odd to walk down the street and not have that mask on a marquee and all the poles. Yeah that was my thought too. My first broadway musical ever - was Aspects of Love. Phantom was sold out a year in advance at the time. Plus knowing nothing of either show, it didn't really matter (I was being "forced" to expand my "cultural horizons" by my parents being in high school and not really knowing much of theatre) In any event, I was shocked how much I loved Aspects of Love and became a huge ALW fan pretty quickly. The fact that Phantom has continued to run as its main competition the year it opened, Into the Woods, has been revived I think 4 times since - is remarkable. Hard to believe it's coming to an end. I do wonder if as someone suggested this is an effort to drum up sales and interest (especially with that reality thing just being announced) and then to reopen with the "new" version
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2022 2:03:36 GMT
I loathed Cinderella, so this isn't to defend it - but I highly doubt he'd close his cash cow for that. We don't need to kick a horse when its down.
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Sept 17, 2022 4:51:04 GMT
Isn't Cinderella going into the Imperial Theatre?
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Post by inthenose on Sept 17, 2022 6:06:00 GMT
It’s not “closing”, it is a cash cow. The cut down West End version will reopen in its place within months of this production ending at the Majestic. “Reimagined and innovative” etc etc..
Broadway’s unions are going to play merry hell, but it will happen exactly as originally planned, with lots of grumbling.
The worst that will happen is one or two hit pieces in the NYP or Times.
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Post by inthenose on Sept 17, 2022 6:06:53 GMT
It’s not “closing”. The cut down West End version will reopen within months. “Reimagined and innovative”. Broadway’s unions are going to play merry hell, and it will happen exactly as originally planned, with lots of grumbling. The worst that will happen is one or two hit pieces in the NYP or Times. Mark my words. The “new” production announced within a few months of closing.
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Post by 141920grm on Sept 17, 2022 9:27:36 GMT
It’s not “closing”. The cut down West End version will reopen within months. “Reimagined and innovative”. Broadway’s unions are going to play merry hell, and it will happen exactly as originally planned, with lots of grumbling. The worst that will happen is one or two hit pieces in the NYP or Times. Mark my words. The “new” production announced within a few months of closing. The likelihood of this happening is even more depressing than the show closing forever lmao... and they'll likely not re-hire much of the "old guard" people who have dedicated a fair part of their lives to the show, built livelihoods around the show... I'd bet money on another fiasco where CM offhandedly goes "I don't understand why people would want to stay in the same show for years and years"... At least we all know CM/ALW's playbook for this by now. End of an era for the original and only POTO...
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2022 11:10:41 GMT
If the show is losing $1 million a month at the Majestic, closing the original production and reopening in a smaller theatre, with the cheaper-to-run London production, seems perfectly sensible. Of course, that's speculation that it will reopen in another theatre, but I suspect demand for the show will be huge over the next five months, and that's the route they'll go down. But whatever spin they put on it, I think the bottom line is the original version of Phantom is unsustainable in the current climate.
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Post by anxiousoctopus on Sept 17, 2022 16:32:55 GMT
Maybe he wants the theatre for Bad Cinderella which will close immediately. It’s an extremely ALW move to close your most famous and successful show to try and prove to the haters that your new not very good show is actually amazing
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18,889 posts
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Post by BurlyBeaR on Sept 17, 2022 17:14:12 GMT
Maybe he thinks people will think “well if I can’t see POTO I’ll go see Cinderella instead”.
They won’t.
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Post by jacob on Sept 17, 2022 17:35:37 GMT
is it not a huge red flag to scare audiences into flocking to Phantom as it’s going to ‘close’, to then just start the budget version elsewhere?? seems off to me
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Post by SuttonPeron on Sept 17, 2022 20:24:59 GMT
If the show is losing $1 million a month at the Majestic, closing the original production and reopening in a smaller theatre, with the cheaper-to-run London production, seems perfectly sensible. Of course, that's speculation that it will reopen in another theatre, but I suspect demand for the show will be huge over the next five months, and that's the route they'll go down. But whatever spin they put on it, I think the bottom line is the original version of Phantom is unsustainable in the current climate. In an article from a couple of years ago, it said it cost around 650k per week to run the show. It must have increased to 800k due to inflation, but its current average weekly gross is around 775k. They may be losing money, but certainly not 1 million a month. That was just reported in the original leak article and not confirmed by RUG, Schubert or Cameron.
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Sept 17, 2022 20:47:29 GMT
The show has been losing money since it reopened. You can see by how much because they release Broadway figures weekly. It's certainly not a cash cow anymore. It would cost millions to move to a different theatre with a new set etc and all the related costs of that, at a time when living costs are skyrocketing and people having to cut down on luxuries such as seeing a Broadway show. There are currently about 20 empty Broadway theatres. It seems the Phans couldn't even save the OG production let alone the London version. Bottom line, people just aren't going to see it anymore. Its been around for 35 years and has employed hundreds of thousands of people (those few that have been there since day 1 have had 35 years of continuous job security and been given 5 months notice, so its hard to feel sorry for them)
It probably will come back to Broadway, but i imagine it will be the smaller production as part of a US tour
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Post by SuttonPeron on Sept 17, 2022 22:14:25 GMT
The show has been losing money since it reopened. You can see by how much because they release Broadway figures weekly. It's certainly not a cash cow anymore. It would cost millions to move to a different theatre with a new set etc and all the related costs of that, at a time when living costs are skyrocketing and people having to cut down on luxuries such as seeing a Broadway show. There are currently about 20 empty Broadway theatres. It seems the Phans couldn't even save the OG production let alone the London version. Bottom line, people just aren't going to see it anymore. Its been around for 35 years and has employed hundreds of thousands of people (those few that have been there since day 1 have had 35 years of continuous job security and been given 5 months notice, so its hard to feel sorry for them) It probably will come back to Broadway, but i imagine it will be the smaller production as part of a US tour Those few? Half the musicians and most of the crew and music department have been there since day one! And most of the people in the ensemble have been involved with the show for a very long time. And of course I feel sorry for them! It´s hard enough to get a new job when you´re older, especially in an industry as competitive as showbusiness. It seems like the Phans care about the people that put their 200% every night in showing the world what musical theatre can be like, and will probably be replaced with machines and cheap labor, so a producer can get even more money. This isn´t the first, nor the second but the third time Cameron has done this.
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Post by Deleted on Sept 17, 2022 22:40:07 GMT
If the show is losing $1 million a month at the Majestic, closing the original production and reopening in a smaller theatre, with the cheaper-to-run London production, seems perfectly sensible. Of course, that's speculation that it will reopen in another theatre, but I suspect demand for the show will be huge over the next five months, and that's the route they'll go down. But whatever spin they put on it, I think the bottom line is the original version of Phantom is unsustainable in the current climate. In an article from a couple of years ago, it said it cost around 650k per week to run the show. It must have increased to 800k due to inflation, but its current average weekly gross is around 775k. They may be losing money, but certainly not 1 million a month. That was just reported in the original leak article and not confirmed by RUG, Schubert or Cameron. It was reported in the New York Post article, but no, I don't know where they got their figures from or who their sources were. But as I said, the bottom line is the original version of Phantom is financially unsustainable in today's climate. I don't think any of the mega-musicals of the 80s/early 90s exist in their original form now, sadly; so Phantom has done very well to run for 35 years. It will have outlived the original Broadway production of Les Mis by 20 years.
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Post by scarpia on Sept 17, 2022 23:56:23 GMT
I was rather hoping to have to delay my next Broadway trip but I guess I can't if this is the only way to see the original again. I have no interest in the cheaper version; I'd rather wait for a properly rethought revival at some point to come along than see the sad ghost of something that used to be genuinely bigger and better.
They really ought to film this since it is the last link to a golden age of big production values with huge talent at the helm. The last production still around helmed by a Broadway titan.
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Post by scarpia on Sept 17, 2022 23:58:26 GMT
So the NY Times have confirmed it. Final performance on 18th February 2023. Cast told earlier today. Shocking. In true RUG style, they were told after they'd found out on the Internet.
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Post by anthony on Sept 18, 2022 0:09:43 GMT
Looking at some data here, the reasoning doesn't make too much sense. Capacity wise, it's performing at around what it was pre-pandemic and has been for a couple of months now. Average ticket sold is $92. Pre-pandemic is actually lower - average of $88 (some weeks going down to low 70s and others low 90s as a high average)
Their weekly grosses are also pretty high. If we look to mid Jan 2020, grosses were $770,000. Even going back to March 2019, gross was 837,647 and early march is in the 600,000s. Grosses over summer reached over $1m multiple times.
I know there are other costs involved and costs have risen, but with the average ticket sale actually rising and the profits are actually some of the highest they've ever seen out of holiday seasons, it's just baffling? It's true they struggled immediately after theatres reopened (January of this year was particularly horrendous for them - sometimes falling under 45% capacity) but they have rebounded to be making some of their highest weekly grosses ever (again, outside of the holiday periods). I appreciate that this still makes it on average one of the cheapest average ticket costs on Broadway, but like I said, the average ticket prices is actually pretty high compared to the years leading up to the pandemic. Which begs the question: if it is losing money, how long has it been losing money for?
Or are we really just going to see the cheapened version shoehorned in within a couple of months?
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Post by bobbievanhusen on Sept 18, 2022 7:28:59 GMT
Those few? Half the musicians and most of the crew and music department have been there since day one! And most of the people in the ensemble have been involved with the show for a very long time. And of course I feel sorry for them! It´s hard enough to get a new job when you´re older, especially in an industry as competitive as showbusiness. It seems like the Phans care about the people that put their 200% every night in showing the world what musical theatre can be like, and will probably be replaced with machines and cheap labor, so a producer can get even more money. This isn´t the first, nor the second but the third time Cameron has done this. No one gives '200%' every night in a job they have done for 35 years. Do you know why the show closed? did the Shuberts give them notice? Not that it would matter. Cameron would would be blamed either way
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