Willkommen, bienvenue, welcome to the top five of Broadway, Cabaret! Still in previews, the Olivier-winning revival of the John Kander, Fred Ebb, and Joe Masteroff musical is already proving itself a hot ticket, debuting last week in Broadway's top five highest-grossers. It's only the second week of grosses for the new production, and it's not even to a full eight-performance week yet. In other words, we're likely to see the production's fortunes rise even higher in the weeks ahead. The production commanded the highest average ticket price last week, $231.14, another metric expected to rise after the show opens and stops handing out comped tickets to press.
Also in the top five were usual suspects The Lion King, Hamilton, Wicked, and MJ The Musical. Those surprised to see Merrily We Roll Along missing from that list shouldn't get too concerned. The show still ranked sixth overall among the 36 shows running. Both Merrily and Cabaret seem to be commanding some seriously high ticket prices, but Cabaret's 100 additional seats may start edging the Sondheim revival out of its perpetual top five status. Stay tuned!
Cumulatively, Broadway's fortunes dipped slightly, down to $35.5 million after last week's high of $39 million. Shows are in an odd place at the moment, with spring breakers filling seats but a huge list of new productions (11 in total!) still in previews and comping lots of seats. That's all to say don't put too much stock in that dip. In just a few weeks, especially once Tony nominations drop April 30, we're likely to see numbers moving upward once again.
It looks like star power is a major driver of ticket sales. Of the season's new titles, several top grossers are led by A-listers. Cabaret has Eddie Redmayne and Gayle Rankin. Merrily has Daniel Radcliffe, Jonathan Groff, and Lindsay Mendez. The Wiz, which made the top 10 last week while still in previews, has Wayne Brady and Deborah Cox. Uncle Vanya didn't make the top 10, but it did bring in grosses just shy of The $1 Million Club, an astonishing achievement for a Chekhov revival still in previews—and it stars Steve Carell. Perhaps this is also why we already have star-driven productions of Othello, Romeo + Juliet, Our Town, The Pirates of Penzance, Stephen Sondheim's Old Friends, and Sunset Boulevard in the works for next season.
T-minus 14 days to 2024 Tony nominations!
Take a look at the full report here.
The $1 Million Club (shows that earned $1 million or more at the box office):
- The Lion King ($2.05 million)
- Hamilton
- Wicked
- Cabaret
- MJ The Musical
- Merrily We Roll Along
- Aladdin
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- Sweeney Todd
- The Wiz
- Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
- Back to the Future
- & Juliet
- An Enemy of the People
- The Who's Tommy
(15 of 36 currently running productions)
The 90s Club (shows that played to 90% or higher of their seats filled over the entire week):
- An Enemy of the People (102.34%)
- Cabaret (100%)
- Merrily We Roll Along (100%)
- Stereophonic (100%)
- Hamilton
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- The Outsiders
- Mother Play
- Uncle Vanya
- Suffs
- Wicked
- Hadestown
- SIX: The Musical
- Hell's Kitchen
- Doubt
- & Juliet
- The Book of Mormon
- Aladdin
- Lempicka
- The Wiz
- The Great Gatsby
- Sweeney Todd
- The Lion King
- MJ The Musical
(24 of 36 currently running productions)