Broadway Grosses Analysis: New Stars Send Wicked's Box Office Flying | Playbill

Industry News Broadway Grosses Analysis: New Stars Send Wicked's Box Office Flying

Donna McKechnie, Mary Kate Morrissey, Alexandra Socha, and more joined the cast March 5.

Graphic by Vi Dang

Broadway's Wicked was seeing even more green than usual last week, pulling past usual winners Hamilton and The Lion King to be Broadway's highest grosser. The long-running Stephen Schwartz-Winnie Holzman musical got a spate of new stars beginning March 5—including Donna McKechnie as Madame Morrible, Mary Kate Morrissey as Elphaba, and Alexandra Socha as Glinda—and it looks like fans were eager to check out the new cast. The show's $1.84 million take for the week put it at the top of the list of highest-grossing shows.

But don't feel too bad for Hamilton and The Lion King. They may have been outdone this week, but they're still at the top of the list, taking the second and third spots with $1.76 million and $1.62 million, respectively. The top five was filled out by fellow usual suspects Merrily We Roll Along and Sweeney Todd.

In fact, there were lots of winners last week. Chicago, enjoying a surge thanks to current star and Vanderpump Rules alum Ariana Madix, played the best non-holiday week of the long-running revival's entire run, bringing in $978,965. The Jeremy Strong-led An Enemy of the People revival saw a six-figure increase from its first week of previews, which already had them in The $1 Million Club. And one of our newest players, the new revival of The Who's Tommy, brought in $345,129 over just two sold-out previews, a figure that could put it in The $1 Million Club after a regular full week, too.

Over the 24 shows currently on the board, fortunes were up 4.73% with 91% of seats filled. Average ticket price hovered at a healthy $119.79, with 204,915 people seeing a show last week.  Only six of those 24 shows played to lower-than-90-percent-full houses, and 12 made it into The $1 Million Club. Let's hope that Spring Break boost continues into a red hot summer.

Take a look at the full report here.

The $1 Million Club (shows that earned $1 million or more at the box office):

(12 of 24 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 (102.73%)
  • Hadestown (101.36%)
  • The Notebook (100.65%)
  • Hamilton (100.43%)
  • Merrily We Roll Along (100%)
  • The Who's Tommy (100%)
  • SIX: The Musical
  • Moulin Rouge! The Musical
  • The Lion King
  • Wicked
  • The Book of Mormon
  • Chicago
  • Aladdin
  • Sweeney Todd
  • Water for Elephants
  • Doubt
  • & Juliet
  • Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

(18 of 24 currently running productions)

 
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