Variety: With tourists pouring into Gotham, summer can be a great time to be on Broadway. Off Broadway? The jury’s still out.
It’s the big, splashy musicals that pull in the majority of warm-weather tourist biz — but producers of a couple of upcoming Off Broadway shows are betting summertime is the right time for a little smaller-scale counterprograming.
2 comments:
Both of these shows sound so interesting! I think that these shows should have no problem attracting people to go and see them, especially the Harry Potter based show. Though there has been a popular show called "A Very Potter Musical", this will still probably draw people's attention. When I worked for a theatre company year-round, one of the tactics that they employed when they did summer stock, and when they picked summer shows, was to find "fun" shows. People won't go see heavy dramas in the summer, mostly because they want a break from things. Also, people are more likely to choose musicals over plays during the summer because they are more likely to fit the "light-hearted" bill. This is a great tactic, to place your more interesting shows in the winter (as in more artsy or adventurous) and to place the more "free" shows during the summer.
Part of the problem, I would think, of trying to get tourists to attend off broadway shows is advertising. Tourists, unlike a native New Yorker, are much less likely to know where to look to see what shows are playing off broadway, whereas advertising for broadway is everywhere. Doing fun shows like the Harry potter based one is more likely to a) get spread via word of mouth and b) be remembered long enough for someone to do the research to figure out where it is.
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