This Was An Overall Slow Week For Broadway, With Most Shows Decreasing From Their Weekly Gross Of The Week Before. Two New Shows Began Previews.


New Shows This Week: “The River” And “Side Show”

In the week ending November 2, 2014, two new shows began previews. First, on October 28, 2014, Side Show began performances at the St. James Theatre. Playing six performances across this first week of recorded box office figures, Side Show grossed the unremarkable amount of $349,563, which represents only 39.67% of its gross potential.

With the maximum numbers of seats to fill being 7,818, ticketbuyers only ended up filling 5,696 of them. This goes to show that Side Show has been offering heavy discounts, as the average paid ticket was only $61.37, with a top ticket price of $197.00.

"The River" Opens With Extraordinary First Week

On the other hand, The River began performances with an extraordinary performance out of the gates. In its first week, it played only three performances, and yet it grossed $348,102, which represents 103.5% of the show’s gross potential.

With a top ticket price of $275.00, the show’s average paid ticket price was $161.01, which implies basically no discounting. Of the 2,088 seats to sell across these three performances, The River sold 2,162 of them, which seems physically impossible – and yet if anyone can achieve the impossible, it’s the team of Jez Butterworth and Hugh Jackman.

An Overall Slow Week For Broadway

This past week, the overall Broadway industry saw a decline in overall weekly gross of $2,393,852, earning a total of $23,464,674. This represents an average of $690,137 across all 34 shows presently running. This is a decrease of 10.20% from the week before. Of the 34 shows, 31 of them saw a decrease in weekly gross from the week before, whereas the only three that saw an increase were Disgraced, The River, and Side Show.

Of course, it must be noted that the latter two increased from $0 the week before, as they opened this past week, so they don’t really count. And Disgraced, which only increased by $45,861 from the week before, is the anomaly having increased its gross each of the six weeks in which it has been running. Still, at its peak this past week, it only reached 52.47% of its gross potential.

The following are the Broadway ticket sales numbers for the week ending November 2, 2014:

Broadway-Show-Ticket-Analysis-11-02-14
Show GrossGross Total Attn %Cap AvgPdAdm
A DELICATE BALANCE $850,150 6,416 100.00% $132.50
A GENTLEMAN’S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER $757,811 7,061 97.31% $107.32
ALADDIN $1,280,885 13,528 98.14% $94.68
BEAUTIFUL $1,033,975 7,844 95.57% $131.82
CABARET $611,122 5,474 76.62% $111.64
CHICAGO $444,182 5,493 63.58% $80.86
CINDERELLA $501,306 6,797 48.52% $73.75
DISGRACED $408,008 5,538 75.41% $73.67
HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH $498,001 5,413 76.79% $92.00
IF/THEN $404,308 7,361 70.18% $54.93
IT’S ONLY A PLAY $1,338,059 8,468 99.02% $158.01
JERSEY BOYS $675,647 6,782 69.04% $99.62
KINKY BOOTS $1,100,572 9,904 86.94% $111.12
LES MISÉRABLES $608,589 7,224 64.09% $84.25
LOVE LETTERS $258,377 3,961 46.36% $65.23
MAMMA MIA! $602,891 7,247 77.69% $83.19
MATILDA $760,087 9,441 82.41% $80.51
MOTOWN THE MUSICAL $855,012 8,993 74.59% $95.08
ON THE TOWN $675,371 8,749 58.36% $77.19
ONCE $341,135 4,836 57.08% $70.54
PIPPIN $377,838 5,026 63.46% $75.18
ROCK OF AGES $278,848 3,476 74.53% $80.22
SIDE SHOW $349,563 5,696 72.86% $61.37
THE BOOK OF MORMON $1,535,238 8,751 102.61% $175.44
THE COUNTRY HOUSE $217,819 3,565 68.56% $61.10
THE CURIOUS INCIDENT OF THE DOG IN THE NIGHT-TIME $862,004 7,911 97.14% $108.96
THE LAST SHIP $495,069 6,333 58.68% $78.17
THE LION KING $1,700,190 13,395 98.49% $126.93
THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA $724,322 8,848 68.91% $81.86
THE REAL THING $433,827 5,765 97.38% $75.25
THE RIVER $348,102 2,162 103.54% $161.01
THIS IS OUR YOUTH $294,214 4,058 47.81% $72.50
WICKED $1,329,813 12,097 83.59% $109.93
YOU CAN’T TAKE IT WITH YOU $512,339 5,656 65.89% $90.58
Totals: $23,464,671 239,269 77.09% $95.19

Broadway ticket sales raw data are provided courtesy of The Broadway League All other data, text, opinion, charts and commentary are copyright © 2014 nytix.com