Broadway's new revival of The Wiz landed in the top five highest-grossing shows for the first time last week, easing on in with $1.48 million in ticket sales at an average ticket price of $117. The Schele Williams-directed revival opened last week as well, making the achievement particularly impressive. The production has been comping much of its house for press and critics around its April 17 opening night. If the production fared that well with comped tickets, it may surge even higher in the weeks ahead.
The Wiz is actually emerging as a potentially powerful competitor to some of Broadway's top powerhouses because of the large capacity of its theatre, the Marquis. The revival was the fourth highest-attended show on Broadway last week, with 12,650 people seeing one of the seven performances. The Marquis' 1,600 seats places The Wiz alongside fellow high-capacity, family-friendly shows like Wicked, Aladdin, and The Lion King—which just so happen to be the only three shows more theatregoers saw last week. It puts the revival in an interesting spot of being able to make the top five top grossers even while bringing in an average ticket price of just $117, the 14th-highest ticket average last week. Compare that with shows like Merrily We Roll Along, which regularly bring in some of the Main Stem's highest grosses with just 966 seats in its theatre, thanks to a dramatically higher average ticket price.
Overall, Broadway's box office fell ever so slightly, to $34.6 million from $35.5. We have an incredibly crowded opening night schedule this year, with lots of productions opening at the last second to beat that April 26 cut off for 2024 Tony Awards eligibility—which is to say that dip isn't exactly surprising when multiple shows are comping seats around opening night. The final openings of the season come April 25 with both Mother Play (at the Hayes via Second Stage) and The Great Gatsby (at the Broadway). Pair that with the April 30 reveal of this year's Tony nominees, and we will have a fully operating Broadway season upon us before we know it.
Joining The Wiz in the top five were usual suspects The Lion King, Wicked, Hamilton, and MJ The Musical. Notably absent from that list are the revivals of Merrily We Roll Along and Cabaret. The former has been lowering ticket prices as some of its starry leads take pre-Tony season vacations, while the latter heavily comped several performances for its opening—we can likely expect to see both much closer to the top of the list again with next week's grosses report, which will be our final pre-Tony nominations box office data.
Take a look at the full report here.
The $1 Million Club (shows that earned $1 million or more at the box office):
- The Lion King ($2.17 million)
- Wicked
- Hamilton
- MJ The Musical
- The Wiz
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- Sweeney Todd
- Aladdin
- Merrily We Roll Along
- Harry Potter and the Cursed Child
- An Enemy of the People
- Back to the Future
- The Great Gatsby
- Water for Elephants
- The Who's Tommy
(15 of 36 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 (102.69%)
- Cabaret (100.09%)
- Merrily We Roll Along (100%)
- Stereophonic (100%)
- Moulin Rouge! The Musical
- Hadestown
- Hamilton
- The Wiz
- Mother Play
- The Outsiders
- Uncle Vanya
- Hell's Kitchen
- SIX: The Musical
- Wicked
- Sweeney Todd
- Mary Jane
- The Book of Mormon
- The Great Gatsby
- Aladdin
- The Lion King
- Suffs
- & Juliet
- Doubt
- MJ The Musical
- Patriots
(25 of 36 currently running productions)
