As we learnt earlier this week, 2009 was yet another record year for theatre in the capital - both in terms of total box office income and the number of tickets sold.
At the beginning of the year, few in London theatre were predicting that 2009 would turn out to be yet another barnstormer.
The year just gone - 2008 - had defied the odds but, with the country heading deeper into recession, surely the industry could not continue to dodge the economic slump. Society of London Theatre president Nica Burns’ prediction of a 10% drop in 2009 did not seem like it would be particularly wide of the mark. In the event, it was way off - with performance up by as much as 7.6%, depending on how you chose to measure it.
This remarkable success, as both Burns and SOLT chief executive Richard Pulford have claimed, was in large part driven by the quality of the product on offer. But surely that can’t be the only reason, when so much of the rest of the economy has suffered.
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