What's Going On, Broadway?

     

    When I think of the past two years of Broadway, all I can think of are revivals, stunt casting, and IP musicals (books turned musicals, movies turned musicals, that kind of thing), and I'm kind of tired of it. I'm also tired of original musicals closing early. I don't know about you, but I think more shows across the board should be lasting at least a year rather than closing five months in. This is just the tip of the iceberg of my 4 prong problem with Broadway right now.

Let's get into it!

4: Stunt Casting

    Originally, this article was going to solely be about this topic, but I felt my opinion on Broadway overall was better. With so many shows that opened this year and are coming to replace them, there is no shortage of revivals and no shortage in stunt casting. Stunt casting seems to be the lifeblood of a post-pandemic Broadway, and I don't know if I particularly like it. I mean, yes, I like it because actors get work either way, but it's actors with an already established popularity or career which is the main idea of stunt casting, but it takes away the possibility of an unknown actor getting their flowers for an amazing job just because they don't have the same clout as a Corbin Bleu or Lea Michele.

    Speaking of Rachel Berry, the best example I can point to is Julie Benko who covered for both Beanie Feldstein and Lea Michele in last year's production of Funny Girl. When Beanie was out for a lot of the show and then left after a contentious run, Julie Benko stepped in every time with rave-reviewed powerhouse performances, and when Lea Michele took over the role, I heard a lot of disappointment about how Julie should have taken over completely instead.

Of course, this was an extraordinary case.

    There have been several cases of blunder stunt casting (Cody Simpson in Anastasia) and amazing stunt casting (Sarah Paulsen in The Appropriate), but notice how none of those shows stay for a long time. They're always limited engagements. (Little Shop and Hadestown notwithstanding). I think stunt casting is a neosporin for a bigger Broadway problem. How can producers who love live theatre not want a production that not only recoups their financial inputs but also runs for a very long time. The same way producers put big marketing campaigns behind stunt-casted actors, why can they not do the same for boots-to-the-ground working actors who are not Patti Lupone, Sutton Foster, or Aaron Tviet? Why do theater actors have to turn to the silver screen for their own big theatre run to be marketable? I have a remedy but that's for later on in the list.

3. Relying on Revivals to Bring Broadway Back

    Let's talk about revivals. I never realized how much Broadway is carried by original productions and revivals until we had two Sondheim productions in the same season. 2022 was the year of Sondheim, not only was it the first anniversary of the virtuoso's passing, but it was also the year that Sweeney Todd and Into the Woods opened and when Merrily We Roll Along was announced to be on the next season's roster. The 2022/2023 revival Tony list was insane. But I also looked at the number of original (non-IP) musicals on the Best Musicals list. 

    There were 4: A Strange Loop (which won), Girl From North Country, Mr. Saturday Night, and Paradise Square.

   I also looked at last year's list for an original production in the Best Musical category. There were also four: &Juliet, Bad Cinderella, Kimberly Akimbo, and Shucked. 

   This year's Tony Award Best Musical list has three: Illnoise, Suffs, and Hell's Kitchen. 

    Where am I going with this?

    There should be more original musicals that live longer than IP Musicals. IP Musicals in this case means anything based on intellectual property which includes jukebox musicals. Anything based on a personality itself with an original score does not match the definition, at least to me it doesn't. 

    It seems that most of the original musicals don't make it to Tony Award Night and that's scary to me. There were many more original plays in the 22-23 season than musicals, and I don't know why. To me, it should be an equal amount of new original (non-IP) musicals as there are plays. Maybe, it's because musicals cost so much more than plays, that's why we're getting more jukebox musicals or musicals based on known IPs and personalities to recoup the investment? I don't know.

   I asked my friend my original question about whether stunt casting and reliance on revivals are contributing to a decline of a full Broadway comeback, and he replied:

           “Broadway's reliance on stunt casting and revivals are just the end result of it being a business, and that's because it is just what works. Some shows that are already not doing great will start to stunt cast to breathe life into themselves, which can give stunt casting a bad rap, but that only looks at a handful of shows.

        But what is iconic for stunt casting? Chicago! Jinkx Monsoon broke records for her stint recently and that is only good. Shows have also got a boost with Jordon Fisher and Lola Tung in Hadestown or Casey Cott in Moulin Rouge, keeping these shows running while pleasing audiences. That isn't always the case, recently with Boy George in Moulin Rouge, but good stunt casting happens more often than failed stunt casting (which at that point is just bad casting).

           Revivals are in the same boat, where if it makes money, that is all that matters in this capitalist market that is the Great White Way. There has been a fear of revivals choking out new shows, but that could not be further from the case this season. Maybe in the future, as the 2020 shutdown still affects the Broadway ecosystem, but that remains to be uncertain. Broadway is very much a capitalistic system that unless we get public funding, the 'free' market is going to aim for what makes money.

    So really both revivals and stunt casting are not bad but neutral aspects of this institution. Sometimes they work and sometimes they don't. Sometimes we get a show that never gets revived and shows people new works (I don't think I would have ever seen Purlie Victorious without the recent mounting). That seems worth it to me for the occasional overwritten, underdeveloped revival of Macbeth. As long as it brings in audiences and keeps the heart of Broadway alive, I can't complain.”

     Maybe one of us is right, maybe one of us is wrong, maybe there's no argument to be made at the end of it, but there has to be something to keep Broadway fresh and original and still put money in producers' and shareholders' pockets at the same time.

2: Not Boosting Rush and BroadwayHD to Combat Accessibility Issues

You hear it everywhere when a new slate of Broadway tickets drops, "Broadway isn't affordable anymore!" to which I argue, it never was or at least it hasn't been in a very long time. But that doesn't mean it has to stay that way. Shows don't boast about it, but most of them, about around 95%, have something called a Rush where you can go to the ticket box office in the morning before a matinee or an hour before curtain and buy a ticket at half-price. Most rush tickets sell around $49-60 depending on the show and how popular it is. It's the best way to get a ticket if you can't afford a $135 + tax mezzanine seat. But shows don't advertise this, and they really should! 

  I personally think they should take the lotto system away and replace it with a full-time rush. I don't know why shows don't do it, but I think using rush is a better option than gate-keeping two tickets behind a lotto system.

  There's also BroadwayHD which if you didn't know (which honestly I don't blame you because it doesn't get marketed nearly as much) is a streaming service that hosts proshots of Broadway shows and has musical movies. Though it has been statistically proven that streaming does not make money, I feel a subscription service may do better in the long run than hoping that people who do not have the means to travel to NY will come to see a show.

   Now you're probably saying "What's the point of live theater then if you're relying on a streaming service?"

     

    To which I say, have you seen the pro shot of Hamilton? Did you see the ticket purchases perk up exponentially after the pro shot was released on Disney+? Legally Blonde had a very successful MTV pro shot that only elongated the run even for another few months before closing despite the whole run on Broadway being a financial disappointment. Now, even though it technically didn't make money for either show specifically, a lot of people who watched those pro shots realized they had to see it live in New York or see a touring production. Streaming didn't hurt it. It gave it more legs, even if it wasn't long-lasting for one. 

    This doesn't mean that response will be garnered for every production, but it wouldn't hurt to experiment. Imagine hearing a show close and instead of being bummed you missed it, you can see its posterity on a streaming app specifically made for live theatre lovers like us?

AND!

   Broadway HD already has a distribution team! Who says they couldn't make pro shots of every show and put it on there? If you're interested in checking Broadway HD out, it can be downloaded. It costs $20 monthly, $200 yearly, and it's ad-free! (I will say if they do use it as income revenue for Broadway producers they might have to make it with ad tiers.)

1: Not Marketing Widely Enough

    The big one. The one that is, I will admit, a little above my pay grade to talk about. But, it is an issue I can't avoid. I have the same problem with Hollywood on this subject but that's a different article altogether. Broadway marketing isn't what it used to be. When I learned about Newsies back in 2012, I saw a trailer for the Broadway production as an ad on YouTube. Since then, I've noticed that Broadway trailers, musicals, and plays, diminished exponentially.

    Within the last year of all the musicals that opened, I've seen two: One for Girl In The North Country and The Great Gatsby. Only 2!! out of more than 10 musicals that have come out I've only seen two. I'm as musical as musical can get. I'm a musical theatre actor for Pete's sake! I should be seeing multiple trailers for multiple shows, but I'm not, and it's really really weird. I think there are two sole reasons for this: Algorithmic marketing and not diversifying social media tactics.

    Let's start with the first one. Targeted marketing means that you're only seeing what your algorithm is curated to show you. So if you don't follow Broadway accounts or interact with musical tags, you more than likely won't see Broadway news. I know I wouldn't if I didn't follow Broadway.com, Broadwayworld, Playbill, or these two awesome accounts, Broadway.4me and Broadway.media. I suggest following all of them. Now, unfortunately, I don't know how to solve this problem. I'm not a social media guru. I don't have a marketing degree or background at all. I don't know what can be done to widen the avenue of reachability for people who love musicals or even those who don't but know people who would.

    Diversifying social media tactics is a method that I'm sure has an actual name I just don't know it, but what I see when I think about it is a great example of Presley Ryan who understudied Lydia in Beetlejuice who (I think) single-handedly revived the Beetlejuice run on Broadway by her tiktoks. Through her tiktoks, Beetlejuice was shown to so many people across the world who didn't even know it existed! Now it has a Tokyo production! How cool is that?

  Diversifying social media is more than putting up 30-second reels on Instagram and TikTok. It's doing several interviews across YouTube. It's doing more than two Good Morning America performances a year. It's reaching out to more Daytime and Late Night shows for interviews and performing. It's reaching out to SNL to perform. It's more than just a billboard on Times Square and on taxis and buses. It's more than a slideshow of what's opening on Playbill.com. It's more than performing on the Thanksgiving Day Parade. I don't know. There has to be more to boost Broadway to the masses. There has to be something better than this.

   What do you guys think? What else can Broadway do to get better? To actually get past the waves of post-pandemic life? Let me know down below.