Was the 2014-15 Broadway season a bad season?

[Clyde15]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:23pm

With An American in Paris announcing their closing that leaves only one show that opened from the 2014-15 Broadway season still an opened ended run, Something Rotten. With Something Rottens numbers falling I doubt it will last past January 1st. It seems that this season did not really have a long running running hit. Was this a bad season for shows? Did they suffer from Hamilton opening up only about a month after the Tonys? 

[Call_me_jorge]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:26pm

I would say the early Hamilton steam overpowered the recent tony award winners.

[ZellMorrowsPledge]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:27pm

I doubt it has anything to do with it but ever since Hamilton opened up a lot of shows have posted closing notices. It's unfortunate 

[Jeffrey Karasarides]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:34pm

For starters, there were several critically-acclaimed productions that closed at monumental losses (Side Show, Honeymoon in Vegas, The Heidi Chronicles, On the Town).

Updated On: 6/23/16 at 07:34 PM

[itis2l84u]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:34pm

ZellMorrowsPledge said: "I doubt it has anything to do with it but ever since Hamilton opened up a lot of shows have posted closing notices. It's unfortunate 

 

"

While I imagine Hamilton has some effect on other shows ticket sales I don't think it's as big of impact as a lot of people think. I recently went to New York to see shows. Since Hamilton is sold out until mid 2017 and I wasn't willing to spend $800 on a ticket Hamilton had no effect on what shows I saw. I feel like that's the case for many other people too. They simply can't afford Hamilton so it makes no effect on what shows they do see. 

A lot of shows are closing because they've simply run their course and not as many people want to go see them anymore. People have already seen shows like Fun Home, Finding Neverland, and An American in Paris. Now they want to see the new shows.

[aaaaaa15]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:39pm

Theatre fans that want to see Hamilton will see other shows too anyway. Non-theatre fans that only want to see Hamilton wouldn't have bought a ticket to most of these other shows.



Updated On: 6/23/16 at 07:39 PM

[ZellMorrowsPledge]

Posted: 6/23/16 at 7:40pm

itis2l84u said: "ZellMorrowsPledge said: "I doubt it has anything to do with it but ever since Hamilton opened up a lot of shows have posted closing notices. It's unfortunate 

 

"

While I imagine Hamilton has some effect on other shows ticket sales I don't think it's as big of impact as a lot of people think. I recently went to New York to see shows. Since Hamilton is sold out until mid 2017 and I wasn't willing to spend $800 on a ticket Hamilton had no effect on what shows I saw. I feel like that's the case for many other people too. They simply can't afford Hamilton so it makes no effect on what shows they do see. 

A lot of shows are closing because they've simply run their course and not as many people want to go see them anymore. People have already seen shows like Fun Home, Finding Neverland, and An American in Paris. Now they want to see the new shows.

 

"

I suppose you're right. I still believe Fun Home is too amazing for only a one and a half year run, especially when it won Best Musical. I guess the world doesn't work that way though

[_IrisTInkerbell]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 8:14am

To go back to the original question if it was a bad season: no, I thought it was an amazing season, and I liked all the shows, and some even so much that I saw them more than once.

And some of those shows sold incredibly well in the beginning, and really only lost steam when the 15/16 season really kicked off. Especially AiP and SR, and to some extent Fun Home. I don't know the statistic of this, but I do wonder if that isn't the case for most seasons (that all/most the shows don't run longer than 2 seasons)? You might have one hit at any given year that will run longer. From the 15/16 season, I'm not sure what will run longer than that besides Hamilton. I see the biggest potential in Waitress, but we'll have to wait and see what happens once Jessie leaves...

 

Certainly, there will be a lot of theaters to go around for the 16/17 season, which I'm not sure if that's a good thing. Most people seeing Broadway shows come into the city for a week and only see 3-4 shows at the most (I think people who see 8 shows in 7 days are the exception), and the more people open in a short amount of time the more the same number of people will be spread over a larger number of shows... I think that's problem, especially with so many shows cramming to open as close to the Tony cut-off as possible. But I think I'm going off-topic

[Dave13]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 8:43am

Not at all.  If anything the 2015-16 season is worse in my opinion. 

Updated On: 6/24/16 at 08:43 AM

[WhizzerMarvin]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 8:53am

There were some bright spots in 2014-2015, but overall it was decidedly mixed.

The plays were better than the musicals. We got: Hand to God, The Audience, Disgraced, Wolf Hall, Skylight, Elephant Man, You Can't Take It With You, Heidi Chronicles (maybe a controversial "good" choice, but I really enjoyed it)

We did get Fun Home and The Visit, which remain two of my favorite musicals in the past decade, but we also we were also saddled with Holler If Ya Hear Me, Doctor Zhivago, Finding Neverland, It Shoulda Been You and Gigi. Honeymoon in Vegas and The Last Ship both had their fair share of strong fans and detractors.

[neonlightsxo]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 10:12am

Jeffrey Karasarides said: "For starters, there were several critically-acclaimed productions that closed at monumental losses (Side Show, Honeymoon in Vegas, The Heidi Chronicles, On the Town)."

 

That happens literally every season, though.

 

[Kad]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 10:17am

I really have seen nothing that indicates that Hamilton has choked out other productions and forced early closures. Fun Home and American in Paris, while successful, were never massive hits or even massive hit material.

[neonlightsxo]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 10:22am

People just like to blame everything on Hamilton.

[Kad]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 10:26am

I've said it previously: the scarcity of Hamilton tickets could, in theory, be a boon to competing shows. I doubt many tourists are letting Hamilton tickets be a make-it-or-break-it factor on their trips to NYC or whether they support Broadway.

Hamilton's correlation with show closures doesn't indicate causation.

[Dave13]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 10:40am

Kad said: "I've said it previously: the scarcity of Hamilton tickets could, in theory, be a boon to competing shows. I doubt many tourists are letting Hamilton tickets be a make-it-or-break-it factor on their trips to NYC or whether they support Broadway.

Hamilton's correlation with show closures doesn't indicate causation.

 

"

I agree with this.  As I have also said, Hamilton is bringing audiences to Broadway that normally wouldn't buy a Broadway ticket.  So I don't see Hamilton taking money and audiences from other shows. If anything, Hamilton maybe increasing ticket sales across the board. 

[asmith0307]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 12:11pm

In case anyone was wondering, post-holidays, here is how it will break down by season (pending upcoming closing announcements)

87/88 – 1 (The Phantom of the Opera)

96/97 – 1 (Chicago)

97/98 – 1 (The Lion King)

03/04 – 1 (Wicked)

05/06 – 1 (Jersey Boys)

10/11 – 1 (The Book of Mormon)

12/13 – 1 (Kinky Boots)

13/14 – 2 (Aladdin, Beautiful)

14/15 – 1 (Something Rotten!)

15/16 – 7 (The Color Purple, Fiddler on the Roof, Hamilton, The Humans, On Your Feet!, School of Rock, Waitress)

 

[Mr. Nowack]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 2:52pm

We forget that in terms of overall theatre season not just Broadway HAMILTON was an offering in the 14/15 season.

[MichelleCraig]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 4:23pm

I would think that HAMILTON would help to lift Broadway overall. Everyone wants to see it, few are able to get tickets, and an awful lot of people pick other shows. It's like going to a big movie on opening weekend; when it sells out, there's overflow to the other theatres/screens.

[VintageSnarker]

Posted: 6/24/16 at 6:14pm

Just my opinion but, kind of?

I liked Constellations and Wolf Hall but skipped most of the plays. Doctor Zhivago, An American in Paris, The Visit, Something Rotten, On the 20th Century, and Side Show all had good elements but I wouldn't call any of them entirely or even mostly successful productions. Then aside from the two Tony winners, Fun Home and The King and I, the remaining musicals didn't really offer much.

I thought 2015-2016 was a better season though there were also a lot of swings and misses.