Broadway Journal

INSIDE BROADWAY’S ROCKY REBOUND

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Broadway’s blockbuster numbers indicate that the box office has recovered from the pandemic. But as production costs continue to soar, the investment climate for everything besides star-driven plays remains grim.

Ahead of the Tony Awards nominations announcement tomorrow morning, I studied the 2024-25 season, which wraps in four weeks. It’s on track to achieve record revenue, barring a hurricane or Covid outbreak that sidelines George Clooney, Denzel Washington, Sarah Snook and Kieran Culkin.Continue Reading

LUFTIG WINS LATEST ROUND IN ‘KINKY BOOTS’ BATTLE

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EXCLUSIVE: A federal bankruptcy judge has approved a reorganization plan for Hal Luftig Co. that gives the busy producer breathing room in his six-year court battle against a deep-pocketed investor.

The litigation involves the 2013 Tony Award-winning musical Kinky Boots, which Luftig produced with Daryl Roth. (Roth isn’t involved in the dispute.) In 2022, an arbitrator found that Luftig and his company breached an agreement with the Reno, Nevada-based investor Warren Trepp regarding proceeds from the blockbuster. Continue Reading

POP STAR SIA ADAPTS INDIE FILM AMID NEA CRISIS (EXCLUSIVE)

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Sia, the Australian pop star whose songs are featured in the jukebox musicals Moulin Rouge! and Hell’s Kitchen, is developing a theater score of her own.

The singer-songwriter behind “Chandelier” is writing music and lyrics for an off-Broadway adaptation of the 2017 independent movie Saturday Church. Damon Cardasis, who wrote and directed the critically acclaimed story about a gay teenager’s difficult coming of age, is collaborating on the musical’s book with the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright James Ijames (Fat Ham).Continue Reading

BROADWAY’S OLDER AUDIENCE STAGES A COMEBACK

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With concerns about Covid on the wane, aging theatergoers returned to Broadway last season, according to a new report by the Broadway League.

As the audience shrank modestly for every age group under 50 years old, ticket buyers who are 50 and up increased, according to the trade association’s new demographic study.Continue Reading

JEFF T. DANIEL FAVORED FOR SHUBERT CROWN

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EXCLUSIVE: The highest-stakes succession race on Broadway appears to be over. Jeff T. Daniel is being positioned to take the reins at the Shubert Organization, Broadway’s largest landlord, people familiar with the company said.

Daniel joined Shubert in the newly created position of chief strategy officer in September 2023, recruited from the touring giant Broadway Across America. He’s also chairman of the government relations committee of the Broadway League trade association. He’s in line to succeed Robert E. Wankel, Shubert’s 78-year-old chairman and chief executive, who’s been at the company for 50 years.Continue Reading

SEAVIEW SCOOPS UP A TIMES SQUARE THEATER

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EXCLUSIVE: The prolific production company Seaview plans to reopen the 296-seat venue that Second Stage relinquished, a vote of confidence for off-Broadway theater as nonprofit companies retrench.

Seaview, led by Greg Nobile and backed by Sony Music, will produce its own shows in the space, according to an application for a state liquor license filed with Manhattan Community Board 4. In 2024, Second Stage ended its lease for the Rem Koolhaas-designed theater, in the former bank building on 43rd Street and Eighth Avenue. Known as the Tony Kiser, Second Stage presented plays and musicals there, including developmental productions of Dear Evan Hansen and Next to Normal. Continue Reading

SIGNATURE AUDITOR RAISES ‘SUBSTANTIAL DOUBT’ ABOUT NONPROFIT’S SURVIVAL

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EXCLUSIVE: Signature Theatre Co. — which raised the bar off-Broadway by devoting entire seasons to the work of major dramatists while offering $25 tickets across the board — is struggling to stay afloat.

Lutz and Carr, the company’s auditor, said it has “substantial doubt about the organization’s ability to continue as a going concern.” The accountant’s alarm accompanies financial statements completed in August 2024 that were posted on the New York Attorney General’s charities registry during Christmas week.Continue Reading

TODAYTIX ADVANCE PROMPTS BOX OFFICE UNION PROTEST

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EXCLUSIVE: Broadway’s box office union, which is in contract negotiations with the Broadway League, claims that the industry’s embrace of TodayTix Group represents an unfair labor practice.

The Treasurers and Ticket Sellers Union — Local 751 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees — accused the League and two of its largest landlord members, the Shubert and Nederlander Organizations, of “unilaterally changing terms and conditions of employment…concerning the distribution of theater tickets.” The complaint was filed with the National Labor Relations Board in connection with TodayTix, the 11-year-old, easy-to-use app for buying tickets to Broadway shows and other cultural events.Continue Reading

‘SOUND & FURY’: INSIDE THE ‘SLEEP NO MORE’ LITIGATION

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As Sleep No More  prepares to close after a historic 12-year run, the producers of the immersive show are in an epic battle against their landlord.

Producers Arthur Karpati and Jonathan Hochwald owed $4.5 million in rent as of July 1, 2024, having guaranteed the payments on their West 27th Street lease, according to their landlord, Harlan Berger, in a sworn statement filed in New York Supreme Court. The debt has increased by about $500,000 a month, per court records.Continue Reading

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