Is the Financial Success of West End Musicals, a Positive Trend - Case Study Example

Is the Financial Success of West End Musicals, a positive trend? The musical shows in the West End are running to packed houses, garnering optimal revenues. However, when ‘sources’ of those revenues are viewed critically, it provides a doubtful picture. Heightened revenues are not due to high attendance rates, but instead due to high ticket prices. In addition, the quality of the shows leaves much to be desired, as most of the shows are adaptations of films and music albums, without original works. Toeing the line of Michael Billington’s January 2011 Guardian article, This West End theatre boom is not all good news, this article will discuss why the financial success of West End Musicals is not a positive trend, as it is based on ambiguous revenue patterns and also because of the lack of originality and quality in majority of the shows. The total revenues at the theatres in London’s West End have been increasing consecutively for the past eight years, with revenues reaching £528m in 2011, which is an increase by 3 percent when compared with the 2010 figures. “Total revenues at the box office rose by three per cent on 2010’s figures to reach £528,375,874 last year, said the Society of London Theatre (SOLT).”1 These positive financial figures showcase how West End particularly musical shows are receiving good crowds, considering the non-favourable business environment in the post-recession period and due to the cold climes. Mark Rubinstein, President of the Society of London Theatre, validates this point by stating, “Despite the prevailing rigours of the economic climate, theatre-goers have acted with their feet and wallets and shown just how much they value a trip to one of our world-class shows.”2 The financial success can be attributed to the popularity of certain musical shows. These shows already had good expectation levels before their staging in the West End. Then, when the performed shows were able to fulfil the expectations of the spectators, it became hits, with some even becoming mega hits, setting the cash registers ringing. Some of the shows, which become hugely popular, leading to favourable financial figures are Jerusalem, Much Ado About Nothing, The Ladykillers, Frankenstein, One Man, Two Guvnors, Yes, Prime Minister, Noises Off, Richard III, as well major productions like The Wizard of Oz, Shrek, Matilda and Ghost. “The Society of London Theatres (Solt) said the arrival of mega-musicals such as The Wizard of Oz, Shrek, Ghost and Matilda meant there were more weeks than usual when big theatres were closed as the shows were installed”3. In addition to these recent hit shows, the already successful shows like Les Miserables, which is now in its 26th year at the West End, also attracted large crowds. Although, the popularity of these shows cannot the discounted, as people loved all these issues, the question that arises is, did this popularity completely translated into revenues or whether the higher revenues is only due to the higher popularity and the resultant higher attendance? The answer to these questions are not a resounding “Yes” because other factors like the increased ticket prices contributed to the higher revenues, and even to the sizable jump in revenue percentage from 2010. This can be understood from the attendance figures for the year 2011, because the attendance has come down from the 2010 numbers, although the revenues were in the opposite direction. “The overall attendance fell by approximately two per cent to 13,915,815 across 52 commercial and not-for-profit houses.”4 This raises the pertinent question that when the attendance figures fell, how come the revenues could increase. That could be mainly attributed to the increased ticket prices, which have been steadily increasing through the whole of 2011, and which will be dealt in a detailed manner in the next section of the article. The other related factor, which implies that increase in revenues is not entirely due to attendance, is the increased VAT rates by the government. That is, the government has increased VAT from 17.5 to 20 per cent in 2011, and that inflated the ticket prices and thereby the revenues even further, and gave the 3 percent jump in total revenues, when compared with the 2010 figures. When these increased VAT rates are not considered, and the total revenues was calculated based on the 2010 VAT rates, the increase in revenue in percentage in just 1 percent, and not the 3 percent.5 Thus, it is clear that although there was a sizable surge in the popularity of the West End Musical shows, and the increase in revenues is a fact, it might be due to increased ticket rates as well as the VAT rates. People who visit London’s West End have to dig deeper into their pockets to watch a musical show, if the trend of high ticket prices persist. The average ticket prices have increased by around 5 percent, with the high end tickets range in the price band of £60-£70. Earlier it was in the range of £50-£60. “The average high end ticket for a London show has risen in price from £55 ($87.70) five years ago to £63.25 ($100.80) today, with a 4.7 percent increase in price over last year alone for the longer-running shows, according to UK travel and leisure discounter Lastminute.com.”6 Apart from the high official ticket prices, certain hidden charges are also added to the ticket costs. This is done by the official ticket agent, and so there are no other options for the customers to approach. “Somehow an extra £2 to £3 has been added to the price, without explanation. It would be excusable if this was some back street operation, but this is the primary agent,”7 This was further validated by Graham Burns, chairman of the Association of Secondary Ticket Agents, who stated that “attaching hidden charges to ticket purchases” makes the already increased ticket fares even more unfair.8 This trend of augmented prices that too in a short period has raised opposition from various quarters. Although, there are people, who are willing to pay the extra bucks to watch the shows, sizable sections of the target customer base find these prices prohibitive. In addition, they opine that the prices also discourage them from going to these shows. This was proven in a survey conducted by the website, lastminute.com. The results show that 55% of people surveyed view the ticket prices of the West End Musical shows as prohibitive.9 The point being raised in favour of these increased ticket prices is that the overall production costs have also increased and includes actors’ salaries, cost of technological equipments used, increasing venue fee, etc, etc. This implies that the producers are not increasing the ticket prices just to earn more profits for themselves, but to achieve break-even. This was pointed out by Solt president Mark Rubinstein, “The profits in the average producers pocket have not been getting fatter”10 However, another criticism against the current West End Musical shows is, increased ticket prices and thereby increased production values does not result in original works. Sizable number of musical shows appears to be spin-offs or adaptations from movies or even the albums by famous music bands. There is a view that commercial interests are driving this trend. That is, when already successful or popular films are made into a musical, it would have pre-release publicity, as people who loved the film would want to watch the musical adaptation as well, and that constitutes a sizable customer base. This aspect of commercial interest was pointed out by Karima Rahman in her article in Epigram who stated that “I am not naïve enough to believe that these decisions are made purely with artistic merit in mind; I understand that with the money put into these productions considerable returns need to be guaranteed.”11 Although, even in the earlier decades, there were sizable adaptation from films, and even vice versa, the recent trend is, more adaptations are made from films and musical albums, without focusing and improving the quality of the adapted material. The other criticism that is levelled is, even the films or musical albums that are selected to be adapted are not optimal quality stuff, and they are below par. This point was echoed by Jonathan Dudley, “If the powers that be must give West End theatre space over to film adaptations rather than original writing, shouldn’t they at least make sure that the source material is actually good”12 Speaking about musical albums and their respective music bands, shows such as Mamma Mia and We Will Rock You were staged at West End to pay homage to the bands ABBA and Queen respectively. In these productions, there were many problems and the overall quality of the adaptation was not up to the expected levels. This was pointed out by Karima Rahman who stated, “The plot is unashamedly weak with tenuous links between songs, sometimes with the original lyrics altered slightly to force them to fit.”13 Thus, when the adaptation is done, the quality drops appreciably, or if said differently, when adaptation is done, the adapted work is not up to the levels of the original. The other problem with these adapted works is that it sticks to the original strictly, without making any interesting changes. Although, a certain section of the spectators would love to see an adapted work which is true to the original, others would want a work, which had incorporated interesting new elements. This perspective was again stated by Karima Rahman, who stated, “I want to go to the theatre and see a show that I don’t necessarily already know the plot of inside out”14 Thus, the issues that are plaguing the musical shows because of these adaptations are the lack of originality, and also the adapted work is not up to the expected levels. From the above discussion of increased financial revenues at West End musical shows and the factors that influenced those revenues, it is clear that revenues pattern is not logical and is not a positive trend. The revenues got accentuated mainly due to increased ticket prices and related VAT rates. On the other hand, the attendance numbers, which ‘should’ correlate to revenues, have decreased. The ticket prices have increased sizably and that is discouraging sizable people from visiting the West End musical shows. References BBC., 2012. West End ticket sales hit £528m in 2011, [Online] Available at http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-16795432 [Accessed March 11, 2012] Bingham, J., 2012. Plays stage come-back against musicals in West End, [Online] Available at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/theatre/theatre-news/9049912/Plays-stage- come-back-against-musicals-in-West-End.html [Accessed March 11, 2012] Brown, M., 2012. West end theatres cheered by rise in revenues, [Online] Available at http://www.guardian.co.uk/stage/2012/jan/31/west-end-theatre-revenues-rise [Accessed March 11, 2012] Dudley, J., 2011. Twitter Has Spoken: Films That Should Be West End Musicals, [Online] Available at http://www.show-and-stay.co.uk/magazine/2010/07/15/twitter-has- spoken-films-that-should-be-west-end-musicals/ [Accessed March 11, 2012] London Loves Business. 2012. West End theatres enjoy bumper year at the box office, [Online] Available at http://www.londonlovesbusiness.com/news/west-end-theatres- enjoy-bumper-year-at-the-box-office/1609.article [Accessed March 11, 2012] McWilliams, K., 2011. Theatre ticket prices along Londons West End continue to rise, [Online] Available at http://www.ticketnews.com/news/Theatre-ticket-prices-along- Londons-West-End-continue-to-rise091108365 [Accessed March 11, 2012] Rahman, K., 2012. Pop musicals: is theatre losing its soul? [Online] Available at http://www.epigram.org.uk/2012/01/pop-musicals-is-theatre-losing-its-soul/ [Accessed March 11, 2012] Travel Monitor., 2012. Theatre ticket prices a turn-off in London West End, [Online] Available at http://www.travelmonitor.com.au/news/destination/theatre-ticket-prices- a-turn-off-in-londons-west-end.html [Accessed March 11, 20 Read More