Mixed Reviews for Phantom 2

Love Never Dies opened in London last night mixed reviews. The Telegraph gives it four stars and the Independent gives it four stars. Other reviews are not so nice. The New York Times didn’t like it at all.

Phantom of the Opera is the highest grossing musical of all time bringing in over 5 Billion dollars. That is more than Titanic (the movie) and Star Wars. Phantom has been seen by over 100 million people in 14 languages. The Phantom also didn’t see 100 percent rave reviews. So who knows what the fans will think. I personally like the one song I have heard. The album is out and I hope to give the whole show a listen soon.

I personally am excited for Love Never Dies to get to the States so I can see it. I have made fun of it since they started talking about it but the press today and the publicity they have done have over the last couple of months have really swayed my perception of the show. Share your thoughts about Love Never Dies in the comments section. I want to know what you think.

FELA

Remember The Color Purple on Broadway? It wasn’t the great reviews that kept that show alive but the lead producer behind it. Oprah. Need I say more? She has so much power and capital behind her that the reviews, which were good, didn’t really matter. The show was actually selling because her name was above the title. There were other producers, and I am sure she didn’t have a huge hands-on producing role, but her name was the only producer's name that was printed every time the title was printed. Stars can bring a lot to a show just by attaching their names.

Yesterday it happened again. The New York Times and Playbill both reported that Jay-Z, Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith have all joined the producing team of Fela! Now the show opens next week, so I would take a guess that their roles will be more in marketing and capital. When tourists who don’t normally go to theatre see Jay-Z and the Smiths' names on that poster, they may be inclined to attend.

I personally think this is a great way to get a new audience into the theatre. Maybe if they like the show they will become repeat costumers and start to build a new audience in a time when our core audience is maybe trying to save more money and see less theatre. My hat is off to the person that made that deal happen. Watch for all the publicity Broadway will get in other markets as we lead up to and after opening night of Fela!

Musicians have been “Locked Out”

It has been reported by the New York Times blog and Playbill.com that the Off-Broadway production of Tony ‘N Tina’s Wedding has stopped using live musicians and moved to recorded music while breaking the musicians' union’s contract with the company. This will be something to watch. So far only local 802, the musicians' union, is making statements. The production has recently changed producers. The agreement with the musicians' union, however, says that they will employee union musicians until 2011, even if the production changes producers. When the musicians returned to work, they were locked out and replaced by recorded music.

The unions have constantly increased their costs and have won some major battles in work rules. This led to the Broadway stage hands strike in 2007 and the 2003 Broadway musicians' union strike.

I am all for paying equal wages and having fair work rules, but it is really out of hand and makes it hard to put up good productions by the shear cost of having union stage hands and union musicians. I won’t go into great detail just yet about the strikes, but I think it is something I will discuss later. On this incident I think the producers should have not locked out the musicians because of the standing contract, but right now we are only hearing the side of the union.

Spider-Man Saga Continues

Yes. It looks like Spider-Man the musical will make it after all. Or at least that is what we know right now. Again, I think this musical is going to be watched so closely be the industry, and I for one hope it does well.

On Friday it was announced that Jeremiah Harris, the lead producer of the new musical, would step down to be the second producer while investor Michael Cohl would step into the lead producing role. Cohl is a known rock concert promoter and I think could save this struggling show.

I have to say I tip my hats to everyone involved in the process. When you start a huge show like this as lead producer you are up against huge odds before you even step out of the gate. In this show you have a high profile writing team and director, huge budgets, people in the press commenting on your every move. You have to keep fighting to just do the job. And I applaud that fight, but more so I applaud the fact that you can step into the number two spot as producer. That’s not easy, but if it is ultimately good for the production, and I think in this case it was, it must be done.

Giving up is never good, but asking for help and charting a new course is better than good. It takes true leadership and a lot of courage. I wish this show the best and can't wait to share more thoughts about this production as it moves closer to opening, which is now to be in 2010.

People to Know - Joseph Papp

Here is a producer after my own heart. Joseph Papp was born in 1921 in Brooklyn to Jewish immigrants. He went on to be one of the most well known and respected producers in history. Papp had a true passion for Shakespeare and tried promoting his idea that there should be free Shakespeare in New York for years when he finally produced and directed Taming of the Shew on the Lower East Side in 1956. He was praised by Brooks Atkinson with a great review in the New York Times, and then his idea took off. And so the New York Shakespeare Festival began. He later moved the festival to Central Park at the Delacorte Theatre, where they still perform today.

After his success with the Shakespeare Festival he wanted to find a home where he could produce year round. In 1967 he created the Public Theatre to produce new and lesser know plays. His first big Broadway transfer was Hair, and because he did stay on as producer of Hair he received no financial benefits. This lesson learned, he went on to produce A Chorus Line and used the money to help fund his other theatres and even help start and run some Off-Broadway Theatres. He also helped produce The Pirates of Penzance, which I discovered has been produced on Broadway 26 times.

He also lead the way in non-traditional casting by using people of all colors in his plays and got involved in gay rights when Congress imposed conservative provisions on the National Endowment for the Arts and produced The Normal Heart, which discussed homophobia and the neglect of the AIDS crisis.

As a producer he brought so much talent, both directorial and in casting, that the lists could go on and on. I wish more producers would take interest in non-profits they way he did. He was able to accomplish so much with the funds from his few Broadway hits, it makes me wonder who will be the next producer to not only produce hits on Broadway, but get really involved in producing lots of theatre and lots of affordable theatre. Someone said Merrick was probably my hero, but I think so far I would have to say Joseph Papp is my hero.

HAIR

We are now four days away from the National Equality March. Broadway is taking a huge interest in this march, and it is exciting for our industry to get so involved. Broadway raises millions of dollars every year for everything from AIDS to Animal Rights. Now they are getting involved in the fight for equal rights. The producers of the Tony Winner musical HAIR are taking the biggest involvement in letting their cast have the day off so they can go to Washington. It is estimated that it will cost them between $100,000 and $150,000 to close on Sunday, October 11th.

As you have seen in my videos of Sutton Foster, they are not the only ones getting involved. Producer David Stone, Audra McDonald, Jonathan Groff and Neil Patrick Harris, as well as some Broadway casts, have raised money to send over 20 buses from New York City to Washington D.C.

The producers of HAIR are not only taking a risk, but they are also making head lines in all the major industry papers, including a great article last week in the New York Times.

I think it was a very smart move for the show about taking a stand for what’s right to show their own commitment to that idea by canceling their show, even though it means a loss for them. I think in the end it will more than make up for it in the press. I know I personally will see it the next time I am in NYC.

Ad Evolution

Artwork is such an important part of advertising a show. When I worked at Arena Stage they had artists hired to draw and design a poster for every show. I loved the variety and loved that it was from different artists and not just a graphic designer who threw something together. I am not picking on graphic designers, but often the season designs look the same and don’t define every show as its own.

I ran across this link in the New York Times about the design and creation of the Ragtime poster and thought it was interesting to see the different stages of design and hear the creative director from the ad agency discuss how they got to the final poster.

In my office I have a poster of the 07-08 Broadway season and love how different the images are. When I look up at it, a couple of them pop out to me. Enjoy the video and tell me what your favorite show poster is.

NY Times Article

Twitter Making Headlines – Part 2

The other headline I mentioned yesterday was about a Casting Director tweeting about actors during their auditions. It was not very smart on her part and while I found some of the tweets humorous she got in trouble with the Actors Union and the Casting Society of America’s President.

I have said it before and I will say it again. We are in a world where everyone is watching and we should all be mindful that the things we post could come back to haunt us later.

Here is the link to the New York Times article.

Twitter Making Headlines

There were recently two New York Times articles that revolved around the social media device called Twitter.

The first involved Next to Normal, a new Broadway Musical, that was nominated this year for 11 Tony nominations. I mocked their Twitter efforts saying it was “too much for me to follow” because they told the whole play through different character’s thoughts for a month. Well, I guess I was wrong @n2nbroadway (the Next to Normal twitter account name) now has over 566,000 followers and while you may ask if that turns into sales. It does. They have found through twitter that people have bought tickets because of twitter. Some people were unsure about the issues Next to Normal raised. When they heard the story told through Twitter they were sold. Even if they just sold tickets to .5 percent of their follows that would mean over 2,000 tickets. Not bad for free marketing.

When you think about it Twitter is not free. The site is but the time it takes to write the thoughts of the characters and strategically market this took hours upon hours of people’s time. And how do we measure the success of a Twitter marketing campaign?

Either the numbers are way off or Next to Normal is a brilliant marketer with Twitter. When I looked at other Broadway Twitter accounts no one even comes close to the number of followers. Hair has less than 5,000 and Rock of Ages has just over 5,000. Hmmm. How could Next to Normal have so many. I went through the first couple of pages to see if they were bots maybe? Nope. They all seem to be legit accounts. In fact since I have started writing this posting they have gained 30 more followers.

What will they do next to keep their followers?

To read the New York Times article click here.

Off-Broadway

Recently when producers talk about Off-Broadway they say it’s dead. That you can’t make money with the costs of unions and marketing with such small house counts. Shows like Glory Days that probably should be Off-Broadway figure there is a less risk in a Broadway house because you get more exposure and almost the same risks.

Well, recently producers like Ken Davenport have been working to fix the reputation of Off-Broadway. Last week there was an article in the New York Times that I thought was worth sharing.

So your homework for today is to read this article and tell me what you think about Off-Broadway.

Yes, You Are A Brand

Everyone here is a brand. We may think of social media as a way to kill time at work, but with this new form of connection moving in all around us, we are actually building brands of ourselves for our peers. Ever since I started accepting my Missouri Thespian students as friends on Facebook, I started to edit my wall. I keep the sexual stuff and profanity off my Facebook. I don’t want that representing me. I am more careful about the pictures posted and things I post, too. My Facebook, Twitter and Blog all represent me.

Some people ask, "Why not just set the privacy to high?" Because that is not me. I want to be open and honest with the people that want to “follow” me. You may not know it, but you are building a brand of yourself with every post. People learn more and more about you. Their opinion is shaped by what they read and the information they can gather online.

I am not trying to scare you into not posting, but just trying to make you think about every post and making sure you represent yourself to the public. Everything you put online could end up on the front page of the NY Times. So just be more careful about what you are representing.