Sean Hayes, star of the return summer engagement of the comedy An Act of God, showed himself, in the production’s first full week of previews, to not to be as big a draw as the play’s 2015 star, Jim Parsons. Houses were at 76 percent capacity at the Booth, with box office taking in $293,212, which represented just 38 percent of the potential gross. The latter was the second-lowest such showing on Broadway, after The Father, which collected only 35 percent of the possible gross.
American Psycho exited the neighborhood with a flourish, it’s box-office take rising a whopping $179,966, which brought the gross up to 59 percent and capacity to 90 percent. Overall, one of the best weeks the musical had during its brief Broadway stay.
Psycho’s jump was the best spike of the week by far. Otherwise, the week was a tale of deflation. Most other shows didn’t show a rise at all at the box office. Likely suffering from the long Memorial Day weekend—which drew locals away from the city and out to the beaches and barbecues. Shows like Something Rotten!, Paramour, Kinky Boots, An American in Paris and The Phantom of the Opera saw six-figure drops at the box office. This all led the overall Broadway box office to suffer a newly $2 million plunge, to $27,019,163.
The overall drain of attendance even caused regular performers like Waitress, The Lion King, Aladdin, The Book of Mormon and Shuffle Along and even Hamilton to slip a bit at the till. Still, all those show played to either capacity or near capacity.
Bright Star, which has made news due to the monetary efforts of its composers, Steve Martin and Edie Brickell, held fairly steady, neither gaining ground or losing it. Seats were 71 percent full, and box office was 48 percent of the possible.
The New York Times went back to The Color Purple and The King and I to re-review the shows with their new stars, Heather Headley and Marin Mazzie, respectively. The review, on May 22, gave both actresses high marks. But that didn’t have an impact on the box office. The Color Purple fell by $36,335, The King and I by $63,162. The King and I posted its closing notice last night.
Just the Numbers: View Complete Broadway Grosses for May 30-June 5
