By Richard Bordelon
It is no doubt that The Book of Mormon is a smash. When it opened in March 2011, this completely new show has sold out nearly every single performance, with tickets ranging from $100 for the last row to almost $500 for prime orchestra seats — quite the price to pay for a two-and-a-half-hour Broadway musical. To date, the show has grossed over $300 million in ticket sales alone (not to mention merchandise and cast album sales) and won the 2011 Tony for Best New Musical.
It’s the kind of success that Broadway producers often only dream of.
To that end, most producers have tried to find shows that can find this kind of commercial success in a very expensive business. While revivals are often more likely to recoup the initial investment of the producers, new musicals are the ones that make the big bucks.
Of the musicals currently on Broadway that have run for more than two years, only one is a revival: Chicago. Long-running musicals, such as The Phantom of the Opera, Mamma Mia!, Jersey Boys, and Wicked, are all still in their original productions. The productions of new musicals have reaped the rewards of loyal fan bases and consistent word-of-mouth marketing among locals and tourists alike.
To launch a new musical, however, is a big risk.
It takes millions of dollars to put a Broadway musical on the stage, and it takes hundreds of thousands of dollars to keep a show running from week to week. Until ticket sales become steady, producers may have to shoulder these weekly costs themselves just to keep a show open in the hopes of award nominations or a sudden bump in sales.
But, let’s not forget the artistic aspect of commercial theater. Musical theatre is, after all, an art form. Many producers try to find shows that balance the commercially appealing and artistically fulfilling aspects of live theatre; these shows should, hypothetically, be the most successful. Occasionally, they take an even greater risk and look for something that is also new, something that has never been done before.
This season, three shows fit this “wholly original” description: The Last Ship, Something Rotten! and It Shoulda Been You. Each of these musicals have a story and score that is not based on any previous material. The Last Ship, which had a score by The Police’s frontman Sting (and even starred him for a few weeks), has already closed, losing $12 million dollars in its wake. The other two shows open in April, at the peak of the Broadway season, and both feature seasoned Broadway performers.
Will Rotten or Shoulda become the next Broadway smash? Could one, or both, of these original musicals run for years to come, like Mormon? Well, only time — and maybe Tony Awards — will tell.
