Broadway seems to be having a nice summer, seeing a steep, nearly-17% increase in cumulative box office last week compared to the week prior. Even without dearly departed top grossers Othello and Good Night, And Good Luck, the 38 currently running shows brought in $43 million, a nearly 10% increase compared to the previous week. Attendance went up, too, with 92.5% of seats filled and 327,954 tickets sold at a healthy average of $131.10 per ticket. This is only week four, but that we're currently beating the same period from last season, which itself reached historic highs, by almost 17% is nice to see.
And yet we'll have to see what happens going forward, because those gains were led by two shows we lost June 22, Smash and Floyd Collins. Theatregoers apparently flocked to see both shows one last time before they closed, giving both of their box offices increases to the tune of six figures. Smash, with $977,805, didn't quite match the all-time high of its run (which put it in The $1 Million Club just before this year's Tony eligibility cut-off), but it did bring in the third-highest sum of its run, and it was $400,000 more than the week prior. Floyd Collins, which ended its limited engagement as announced the same day, did see the highest box office of its entire run with $754,317, a $258,106 boost compared to the week before.
The top five remained unchanged from last week, and that is likely to continue. Wicked saw a $144,000 increase to bring in $2.5 million, followed by Glengarry Glen Ross' $2.23 million, Hamilton's $2.17 million, The Lion King's $2.14 million, and Sunset Blvd.'s $1.83 million.
This top five of usual suspects is such an interesting test case in the impact of Tony Awards. Wicked and Glengarry Glen Ross both famously did not so great on Broadway's biggest night, but they're the top of the charts. Hamilton and The Lion King, of course, have been long-time running Tony success stories for some time now, and Sunset Blvd. has seen its own fortunes rise steeply since its wins this year for Best Revival of a Musical and the Best Leading Actress in a Play Tony for leading lady Nicole Scherzinger.
Thanks to that success, and with reports emerging that director Jamie Lloyd seems to have repeated his winning formula with a Rachel Zegler-led revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Evita in London's West End, keep an eye out for rumblings of that coming over in the next few seasons.
Take a look at the full report here.
The $1 Million Club (shows that earned $1 million or more at the box office):
- Wicked ($2.48 million)
- Glengarry Glen Ross ($2.23 million)
- Hamilton ($2.17 million)
- The Lion King ($2.14 million)
- Sunset Blvd.
- The Picture of Dorian Gray
- Aladdin
- Death Becomes Her
- MJ The Musical
- The Outsiders
- Oh, Mary!
- Buena Vista Social Club
- Gypsy
- Just in Time
- Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
- Stranger Things: The First Shadow
- Maybe Happy Ending
- The Great Gatsby
- Hell's Kitchen
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- & Juliet
(21 of 38 currently running productions)
The 90s Club (shows that played to 90% or higher of their seats filled over the entire week):
- Just in Time (103.62%)
- John Proctor is the Villain (102.54%)
- The Outsiders (102.22%)
- Hamilton (101.44%)
- The Picture of Dorian Gray (101.28%)
- Glengarry Glen Ross (100.57%)
- Oh, Mary! (100%)
- Wicked (100%)
- The Lion King
- Hadestown
- Operation Mincemeat
- Buena Vista Social Club
- Death Becomes Her
- Purpose
- Aladdin
- Pirates! The Penzance Musical
- & Juliet
- Sunset Blvd.
- The Book of Mormon
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- The Great Gatsby
- Hell's Kitchen
- Cabaret
- Floyd Collins
- MJ The Musical
- Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
(26 of 38 currently running productions)
