On Broadway anyone can keep track of how shows are doing: the Broadway League (the equivalent of SOLT) release the weekly box office grosses for publication in Variety and on Playbill.com. Though individual producers can opt out - as Young Frankenstein has from the beginning of its run - this apparent frankness about the business of show in showbusiness creates a sense of openness and allows every producer to size up the opposition publicly as well as privately.
The West End, by comparison, is a “closed shop”; though investors will be given information on how their shows are doing, and SOLT collects and publishes annual figures across the board of the member theatres they represent, individual accounts (and accountability) are hidden from view.
Given that it is (mostly) still a private business, there is no need for them to go public, but it creates a strange kind of guessing game in the West End, based purely on anecdotal evidence about how shows are doing.
The best indicator, of course, is going to the theatre itself and counting the house: I am shocked to read that the West End Whingers, who actually buy their tickets for regular performances instead of papered opening nights, found this week that both the Donmar and Almeida were less than full for the preview performances they went to of both Creditors and Waste respectively. As they point out, “The credit must be thoroughly crunching. After rattling around in in the less-than-full Donmar auditorium at Monday night’s Creditors the Whingers witnessed another rare event last night: the Almeida auditorium less-than-packed to the rafters.”
If the Donmar (with just 250 seats) and the Almeida (with 325) can’t fill up with their reputations, followings and mailing lists, what hope the rest of the West End? That’s where discount offers come in. The Donmar and Almeida may be too proud to usually do so, but the other guide to how shows are doing is to check out which ones are currently discounting. And right now, that’s pretty much everyone: all but a handful of shows are appearing on the daily online lists of what is available at the SOLT’s half price tkts booths at Leicester Square and Brent Cross shopping centre. But tkts still requires you to turn up in person, and on the day of the performance, to buy the tickets, so it’s harder to plan.
But nowadays there are plenty of advance offers, too, that can also be taken as a barometer of how good business is; the ever-invaluable Theatremonkey even usefully aggregates them in one place. You’ll find, for instance, that the now-previewing trilogy of The Norman Conquests is currently offering a top price ticket reduced from £45 to £30 (plus a £2.50 transaction fee) via an offer in Metro, though if you go to the half price booth, they’re available there, too, for £23.75, including the booking fee.
So it’s no surprise to read today’s announcement that Never Forget, the Take That musical that has been limping at the Savoy, has cancelled its plans to move to the Lyric, Shaftesbury Avenue. There have been countless offers doing the rounds - from £27.50 at tkts to two for the price of one tickets via a Daily Telegraph offer - since the show first opened at the Savoy, and it seemed unduly optimistic that downsizing its seating inventory at a smaller theatre would help it to sell more tickets, or at any rate sell a higher percentage of those available. The die was cast when, as reported by The Stage, the producers failed to secure agreement to downsize cast salaries as well.
Indeed, this is an interesting time for the producers of Priscilla to be introducing the already discredited practice (courtesy of one M Brooks) of "premium seating.
I guess they had to mention that the tranfer of Never Forget was off once Eddie Izzard announced he is using the Lyric for a month of performances at the same time they were supposed to be there!!