(Not so) Glory Days for a new Broadway musical….

An earlier report in Variety last week told how its producers John O’Boyle and Ricky Stevens (who in the last year have provided backing of two productions that closed without recouping, Radio Golf and Is He Dead?, as well as the still-running A Catered Affair) were taking their first gamble as lead producers with Glory Days, and how they had come to place it on Broadway: according to Stevens, “We looked at it as a regional vehicle, as a touring vehicle, and an Off Broadway vehicle, and we couldn’t make any of the business models work. But once I did the business model for Broadway, we said, ‘It could work here.’” The reasoning? His producing partner O’Boyle put it this way: “”If you’ve got a $1 million budget Off Broadway or a $2.5 million budget on Broadway, you’re better off taking a chance on Broadway. It comes with a higher ticket price and the accessibility to a larger audience.”

The stakes are higher, but so is the potential reward. Except when that larger audience fails to materialise: the grosses reported for last week reveal that the show was seen by just 1,171 people across the entire week (in a house that seats 670), representing just 21.8% of potential capacity -and those that did see it came almost all came on discounts: the average ticket price was just $40.01.

One problem, of course, is that it was arriving in a very crowded marketplace - but then that’s nothing new at this time of year, where almost every Broadway house is currently lit or booked, as in the case of the Imperial and Broadway Theatres where Billy Elliot and Shrek arrive in the autumn. But as a feature in Crain’s New York pointed out earlier this week, “there are too many productions to go around, especially during a recession. Twenty-one new shows opened this spring, compared to 17 a year ago.” It quotes producer/investor Daryl Roth, who is currently represented by five shows, saying, “There are a lot of things on the boards now and people are making choices. The economy is making people think that instead of seeing three shows, they’ll see one.”

And of course, when that happens, people choose what they know - or know about. The decision to move Glory Days was made late in the day - and with no stars to sell it, either, there was little time to build brand recognition around it. Instead, the show had to sell itself on its own merits; and that’s where the critics deal the final, fatal blow. Its two writers Nick Blaemire (who is currently also part of the performing ensemble of another ailing new musical, Cry-Baby) and James Gardiner, both in their early twenties, started writing the show while still at college - and the story of how the show got to Broadway at all may be more interesting than the show itself.

But as the New York Times squib on the sudden closure of that effort put it, “Encouraging young talent isn’t the same as paying the bills on Broadway.” And many of the reviews pointed out that the supposed encouragement may have actually been a disservice: As Adam Feldman said in his review in Time Out New York, “Glory Days is a show that one might reasonably expect to see for $20 at the New York Musical Theater Festival, and then speak charitably, if asked, of its ‘potential.’ Untimely ripped from the womb of development, however, it has now wound up at Circle in the Square, where its dim sparks of promise are washed out in the harsh glare of Broadway lights…. By charging $97.50 for 85 minutes of musical guidance counseling, the producers do a disservice not only to audiences, but also to this unready show’s young creators and stars. Sometimes it is cruel to be kind.”

That sentiment is echoed by David Rooney’s review in Variety: “Given a modest production at Virginia’s Signature Theater earlier this year, the show received encouraging reviews from D.C. critics, but nobody appeared to be saying this larva was ready for mainstream metamorphosis. The producers have done an extreme disservice to the inexperienced creative team by shoving them into the spotlight with what’s likely to be a commercial embarrassment.”

In the New York Times, Ben Brantley notes the uptown transfers for the downtown musicals Passing Strange and In the Heights (though the latter is actually set very uptown, but actually started at an off-Broadway house less than ten blocks from where it is now), and says, “I can see why the producers of Glory Days might have thought this was an auspicious moment for a big-time New York transfer. Ultimately, though, they have done this little, hopeful show no favours by dragging it into a spotlight that invites close and unforgiving inspection.” But he generously adds, “I do find it heartening that a pair of enthusiastic and gifted young artists have fallen in love with that beleaguered form, the musical, as a means of self-expression. The lyrics of Will’s concluding song is a humble expression of both the show’s limits and the possibility of something more substantial to come. He wants, he says, to tell a story that ‘can find a way to say/’This is only who I am today’/And there’s so much more to see.’”

Let’s hope there will be, and that its young authors won’t be put off forever by their experience here. As it is, their show now has the rather dubious distinction of becoming the first new musical to shutter on its first night since Dance a Little Closer, Alan Jay Lerner’s final show, in 1983, that was quickly redubbed Close a Little Faster. On the plays front, Ellen Burstyn’s solo show Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All also closed on its first night in 2003; but the Farrah Fawcett vehicle, Bobbi Boland, didn’t even get that far in the same season, closing during previews.

Broadway puts shows in a uniquely unforgiving spotlight; but it can also offer the potential for further life beyond it. Variety declared in advance of the opening that, “No matter how it performs, the imprimatur of a Broadway run can boost the show’s chances for future productions. Given that it’s a one-set, four-actor, 90-minute piece about teenagers, the addition of Rialto credibility could make the musical catnip for companies seeking young auds. (And young men, the holiest of holy grails among theater demographics, may be more interested in a show that’s ostensibly about their lives.)” But while those virtues may have given the show a head-start in seeking a longer life elsewhere, a one-night run may have now given it a notoriety it will sadly be impossible to shake off.