Re: Tony Show is symbolic of Broadway

Date: 05 Jun 2003 17:17:33 GMT
Newsgroups: rec.arts.theatre.musicals
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>That's pretty obvious, and not surprising. What producers tell you is what is
breeding the mis-information so I am not surprised you hear it since I do.
I sit on the Council of the Dramatists Guild and we do not take what the
producers say at face value, I assure you. Our job is to question and test the
veracity of everything they say.
Nor do writers believe bigger is better. The Guild is dedicated to the
proposition that playwrights have the right to considerable say about the
circumstances of the production of their plays. And the only way to exercise
this responsibly is to be informed. So education in these areas has been part
of the mission.
>That's also why writers who make five figure weekly incomes from a Broadway
show from which they should be able to live comfortably for long enough to
produce another show think they have to go into film and TV where the lure is
six figure weekly incomes.
This is sheer silliness. The number of Broadway writers who make five figures
a week from a Broadway show is very tiny indeed -- mostly the authors of huge
musicals and very few of those are new ones. I have been working in film and
TV for more than twenty years, and only the tiniest percentage of
writer-producers make above five figures a week, and most don't make more than
four. (And I've won a WGA award and been nominated for the Emmy, so I'm not
exactly a neophyte in these areas.) You are extrapolating into a generality
from the circumstances and incomes of very few.
>I provided you with an explanation of the costs and revenues. You can ask any
General Manager in town and they will confirm this. I am not about to share
someone's books with you.
I have a few friends who are general managers and they will not confirm this.
I am dealing with a general manager on a show at the moment, and I've looked at
figures and prospecti for various projects. There is no way that a large-cast
musical can play in a house of fewer than 200 seats and pay the appropriate
Equity minimums and still make a profit. The off-Broadway run of URINETOWN was
a loss-leader. They knew they were going to lose money in the service of
getting a reputation that would help them capitalize for Broadway.
> Can you be in trouble earning $200000 a year just because you can earn $2
million?
Very few people are earning $200,000 in royalties on Broadway much less $2
million. Just because Mel Brooks and I are both writers doesn't mean that I
earn what Mel Brooks does.
>Talking Heads has stars, and is happy off Broadway.
It doesn't have TV stars. It has theatre stars. And, yes, of course it's
happy off-Broadway. It's where it belongs. And what do you think that proves?
> It's nice that your arguments keep having a way of proving my points.
No, you keep misunderstanding what I say, rephrasing my points inaccurately,
and then demolishing your own inaccurate rephrasings and thinking this means
victory.
>They don't sit down and think this out. It is inbred. If they sat down like
business people they wouldn't do what they do so often.
Of course they think this out. The Schuberts and Nederlanders and the rest are
not starry-eyed characters, they're canny business people looking to make and
save money. (As their tactics during the recent musicians strike attest.)
They put shows where they think there are paying audiences for them. And
sometimes they miscalculate. But they know they only have to calculate
correctly a certain percentage of the time to offset the cost of the
miscalculations.
>
> In the case of AMOUR, the Schuberts wanted to put something on in one of
their theatres (they always want something in their theatres and their theatres
are on Broadway) and the talents involved were largely people associated with
Broadway.
>
>This also proves my point. The Shuberts (not the composer) have a vested
interest (THE vested interest) in bringing shows to Broadway. But this show, a
pet project, would have been happy off Broadway if reason had been the
controlling factor.
You are unfamiliar with the rights writers have. If Legrand, Lapine and
company didn't want to be produced on Broadway, they could have refused and
pursued off-Broadway production. They obviously thought a small Broadway house
would be a good home for the show. Of course, there is the possibility that
the show wouldn't have played better off-Broadway.
>
> I have no idea of why FROG AND TOAD was produced on Broadway, except perhaps
they were aiming for the tourist trade and tourists with kids are chary of
going into neighborhoods they don't know. I agree that FROG AND TOAD was a
miscalculation, but one miscalculation does not a trend make.
>
>It's hardly isolated. It's epidemic.
Tish tosh. Anyway, we'll see if they can't parlay the Tony nominations and
national attention into a profit on the road that they couldn't have earned
off-Broadway. This may have turned out to be a reasonably good business
decision after all. Frequently shows make more money in their afterlives on
the road than they did on Broadway.