After the news of the fast recoupment of the capitalization of Guys and Dolls in the West End noted here on Saturday, but dire notes about the spiralling costs of production on Broadway reported yesterday, comes news of another fast payback – Monty Python’s Spamalot, too, has just paid back its investment, just six and a half months after opening at Broadway’s Shubert Theatre.
Which makes their recent decision, also reported here on October 6, to hike the top price up to $111.25 even more disheartening: it’s clearly simply a fleecing exercise, to derive more profit from something that’s profitable enough already. I suppose, though, its pure business economics, too: you charge what the market will bear. But amidst such exercises in corporate greed, is it any wonder that the entertainment unions who, in yesterday’s report, were being urged to make various concessions to prop up the ailing invalid of Broadway might be just a bit suspicious?
