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Don't raise your voice to prove you're right. Focus your mind with every word of irrefutable fact you can find, because conviction is the calm that comes when you know that you really do know. People who read the Financial Times know that they can shape their own perspectives with confidence because their viewpoints are informed by genuinely unbiased journalism, clarity and conviction. Source FT subscribe to the financial times@ft.com Sourceft producing theatre at the highest level has always been something of a dangerous game. You can open a show to dreadful reviews and no ticket sales and lose six figure sums of money, seven figure sums of money. Or your show can become a surprise hit, transcend all levels of expectation and cross over into the realms of genuine cultural phenomenon and over its long lifetime, gross more money than any film franchise franchise ever made. Those, of course, being two wild extremes, with the majority of shows produced falling somewhere in the middle. But over the last couple of years, in the most recent Broadway seasons, is the average metric of success, particularly for new musical theatre, beginning to skew in a slightly more negative direction? Simply put, are fewer and fewer new musicals able to succeed on Broadway? And if so, why is that? Well, the question has been asked in the New York Times, the question has been asked at cocktail bars around midtown Manhattan, and the question has been asked in comments sections of various videos of mine over the past couple of months. And here I am today to answer it. Is Broadway Dying? This conversation has been a long time coming. There is plenty for us to discuss and while I am not going to tell you that the sky is falling as we seem to hear every single day in the theatre industry, I will caution you that there are definite storm clouds on the horizon. Oh my God. Hey, welcome back to my theatre themed YouTube channel. Or hello to you if you're listening to this on podcast platforms. My name is Mickey Jo. I am obsessed with all things theatre. I am a professional theatre critic, content creator, a pundit, and today, for those of you watching me right now on my theatre themed YouTube channel, I have come dressed for Broadway's funeral because we are here to finally answer the question that I have been teasing in many recent episodes, which is is Broadway dying? And specifically the Broadway musical Now, the New York Times released a piece about this not long ago which we are going to talk through today, but it's something that I had been wanting to discuss even before that. Yes, they beat me to it, those rascals. Because this reflects conversations that I have been having with with investors, with producers, all of whom work in a transatlantic capacity. Also with people who work on Broadway, in marketing, in social media, with theater goers, with actors. There is some concern throughout the industry that the way that everything used to work and the way that everything is supposed to work doesn't necessarily feel like it's working right now, particularly when it comes to new musical theater and its ability to become profitable, its ability to earn enough money to recoup the initial investment that was spent creating the show in the first place before it can then, you know, turn a profit. And one of the aspects of this conversation that we're going to be talking about today is the limited number of new musicals since theaters reopened a few years ago that have actually been able to do that. By extension, we're going to talk about how this has then affected the Broadway landscape. We're seeing it very much already in the shows set to open in the forthcoming Broadway season. Fewer new musicals, but more star led plays. More smaller productions. We're going to talk about how this generally impacts the quality of Broadway shows. We're going to talk about the wider theatre community and how this affects Off Broadway and other theatrical ecosystems. And with days before this story is set to develop even further, we are going to talk about the possibility of an impending Actors Equity association strike. On many fronts, the news is not looking good. But for those of you who have been paying attention to grosses and closing announcements over the past few months, that won't necessarily come as a surprise. And so, with little further ado, let's embark on this conversation. As always, I would love to know what you think. Share all of your thoughts, your feelings, your insights in the comments section down below. And if you want to stay up to date with all of the latest Broadway and worldwide theatre news and hear what I have to say about it, make sure to subscribe to my theatre themed YouTube channel or follow me on podcast platforms. In the meantime, do we need to be readying ourselves emotionally for the funeral of Broadway as we know it? Who would they book to sing at Broadway's funeral? Wow, what a question to start with, and honestly one that I think is too big to answer. But this we can Is Broadway dying now? I've experienced this conversation in enough different rooms and in enough different forums to know that when you ask this or when somebody brings it up, the room will will always be divided and there will always be those on one side of the room who will say that all of this has happened before, that it's cyclical and that we shouldn't go around claiming that the sky is falling and that this happens all of the time and that people have said this repeatedly several times over the past two and a half decades, and they have, but it's been for various different reasons, many of which have reflected nationwide or global issues. For example, back in the very early 2000s, in the immediate aftermath of 9 11, there was a reduction in global tourism, particularly to Manhattan, to New York City. Fewer people, for obvious reasons, were traveling to New York, and Broadway shows were suffering as a result. What we saw in the period that followed was various changes on a financial level, on a creative level, among several different production shows were cast in a way that they weren't going to be. Some shows thrived in that particular emotional environment, others really struggled, some were pushed back, some were cancelled entirely. But eventually enough time had passed and Broadway was able to steady itself for long enough that it could weather that particular storm. Another significant, significant challenge came in 2008 with the global financial crisis. Though inherently this was a global problem, not only specifically affecting Broadway, and then of course, a few Years ago in 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic shut down the entire world, forcing live theatrical performances to come to a halt and really impacting the live entertainment industry, not just on Broadway, but at theaters around the country and around the world. And so people are correct when they will tell you that this has happened before and Broadway has struggled on previous occasions. But the difference with what's happen now is it isn't in response to anything specific that is happening nationwide, in the US or globally. Yes, the US is experiencing a very specific political moment which will have an impact on tourism, but the Broadway financial issues happening right now aren't wholly reflective of that. Yes, there is also a cost of living crisis. Yes, there is also financial strain. But Broadway's problems are bigger than all of that, sadly. And what they essentially boil down to is that production budgets, particularly for the biggest shows, are spiral feeling beyond control, are becoming wildly more expensive than they were even a few years ago. There is some more detail around this in the New York Times piece the Broadway Musical Is in Trouble, shared by Michael Paulson On September 22nd of this year, which begins by pointing out that none of the 18 commercial musicals that opened on Broadway last season have yet become profitable, with obvious flops having included Tammy Faye and Boop and Smash and Redwood, but also going on to point out that the revivals of Gypsy and Cabaret and Sunset Boulevard had not been successful in recouping their investments. But the paragraph I really wanted to share with you is a little further down the piece, and it is this one. He points out that a decade ago the big musical comedy Something Rotten, with a cast of 25 cost $14 million to capitalize to put up in the first place. Last season's Death Becomes Her. Another big musical comedy with a cast of 20 cost up to $31.5 million. I remember when New York, New York was coming in, I think with a budget of $25 million, which seemed ludicrous. And so in just a short space of time, it's getting even higher. It's getting even more insane. The high capitalization costs combined with high running costs means shows have to run much longer to become profitable, if they ever can. And while shows taking a decent amount of time to recoup their initial investments, particularly big productions of new musicals isn't necessarily anything new, it is telling and troubling just how many of them are in this position and how few have recouped since theaters reopened a few years ago. The fact that the Outsiders still hasn't announced recoupment on its investment is sort of bewildering because they have great grosses, they have great average ticket prices, they don't have star names in the cast. It's not a tiny cast, but it's not like celebrity fees happening. They have a really dedicated fan base, they have lines at the box office, they have the best new musical Tony Award win. This is a show that has everything going for it and has done for over a year now and still hasn't recouped because it is just so expensive. And it's not alone in that position. Death becomes her, as has been pointed out in this article, hasn't yet recouped. In fact, nothing new musical wise from the most recent seasonal Broadway has yet recouped. Maybe happy ending, another one that hasn't. Just in time seems like it is approaching that milestone faster. And the Outsiders truthfully probably is going to announce before too long. But since the pandemic, only three new musicals on Broadway have actually announced that they have recouped. One of them is MJ, another is and Juliet, and the third is 6, which is evidently a smaller, less costly production the likes of which producers are now quite eager to emulate. And that's just specifically in the world of new musicals, Merrily We Roll along as a musical revival also recouped investment. I believe that Gutenberg may have done as well, obviously a two person cast. But various shows which you may have perceived to be terrific, huge Broadway successes, haven't necessarily been successful financially. And that admittedly is purely within the confines of their Broadway run. You have shows like A Beautiful Noise, the Neil diamond musical, which have announced recoupment during their national tour. So they make their investment back after the time spent on Broadway. But the reality of a show like the Outsiders still having not yet become profitable is sort of galling and invites a lot of questions about where all of that money is going, because a huge amount of it goes on rent to the theater owners. But I'm hearing that in 2025, there are other shifts to the financial landscape of the whole thing, with cast recordings being one example of this, cast recordings that are now generating less income for these shows because of shifts within the music industry, making the recording of a cast album a less profitable endeavor, but something that is still expected of all new Broadway musicals and sort of a necessary marketing tool if they want to become successful in the first place. But it's scary to think that for a lot of these show, last album is actually a significant financial burden. Now. We've been hearing about these spiraling Broadway budgets for some time now. Andrew Lloyd Webber spoke about it and is quoted in this piece. He said, Broadway is not a business anymore. The statistics are terrible. I am very worried. I look at the economics of this and I just don't see how it can sustain. And this is a man of extraordinary wealth. And as I read that, I was reminded of comments that Sonja Friedman had made a few months ago, also in an article by Michael Paulson for the New York Times. Sonja Friedman, being a powerhouse producer who works consistently on Broadway and in the West End and is often well represented at the Tony Awards and the Olivier Awards every single year, she will always deliver hits. But in that piece it said, for years she has expressed concern about the high costs of producing on Broadway, particularly when compared to the West End. But her concern has intensified since the pandemic as rising costs for labor, materials and services have driven show budgets and ticket prices for hot shows even higher. She said, for example, that the Hills of California, a family drama by Jez Butterworth that she produced last year in both cities, again, not star led, not really, face production costs that were 350% higher in New York than in London. 350 percent higher. And that's for a new play. We've kind of been narrowly focusing on the world of new musical theatre, but this is affecting Broadway on many different frontiers. This is a direct quote from her. She said, the fact that plays are now hard to produce for less than $6 million or $7 million is of course of great concern, let alone musicals. And don't even ask me how much Stranger Things is going to cost. This is a woman who often produces very expensive plays. Which inevitably brings us to a conversation about ticket prices and the reality that audience numbers haven't quite resurged to pre pandemic levels yet. Which I will point out is moot when we're having a conversation about a show like the Outsiders, which has consistently had great audience numbers, great capacities and still has not recouped its investment. But for the sake of argument, let's say we are talking about dwindling audience numbers alongside all of this. The problem that you have is people are quite rightly and fairly going to say fewer people are going to the theatre because fewer people can afford to go to the theatre or travel to New York in the first place. That's if to go to New York in the first place with everything else that's happening in the US and in the world, quite frankly. And so Broadway needs to lower its ticket prices, find a way to make shows more affordable if it wants more people to go to the theater in the first place. And the challenge is that we are hearing everything is costing more. All of these budgets are increasing and increasing and increasing. So there is no feasible way of reducing ticket prices en masse across the industry while everything is simultaneously taking longer to start becoming profitable. As it is, you end up limited runs being announced that within their lifespan are from the off never going to turn a profit. There is just no possibility of it even happening if it's going to take as long as it is. And with odds like that, I would imagine that it would be harder to get producers involved with new musicals. But I don't have to because that's also a reality that's being talked about, not just the ones that are suing Cabaret because the relationship between them and the show's producers has become strained and because there is an alleged lack of transparency about how money is being spent and how funds are being retained to keep the show open. Happen perhaps longer than is necessary or was advisable. There's a Broadway investor named Eric M. Gardner who is quoted in the New York Times piece, who it is said has been turning down offers to put money into new musicals because the budgets he sees are so big that he doesn't believe the shows can recoup their capitalization costs. And one thing that did exist to reassure investors sadly looks like it might be going away. This is in particularly bad news because there is state funded tax relief that is set to run out. And we're going to learn a little bit about this together as we try and walk through this difficult financial reality. But this Back in the New York Times piece on the subject of those three new musicals, MJ and Juliet and Six, I will remind you that have recouped since the pandemic. All three of those got assistance from the government. Six and MJ each got $10 million from the federal government in the form of shuttered venue operator grants designed to help the arts recover from the shutdown. And Ann Juliet benefited from a $3 million tax credit through a New York State post pandemic program. The federal program ended and the state program, which has aided almost every show to open over the last few years, will end this fall unless it is renewed. For a little more about that, we are going to broadwaynews.com who have covered in extensive detail and I would suggest if you are interested, you go and check this out. What is going on with the Downstate Tax Credit they reported earlier this summer, the Broadway League learned that the funds for the New York City musical and theatrical production tax credit had been unexpectedly depleted. This in surprising and bad news. The program, colloquially known as the Downstate Tax Credit Credit, had been renewed in May as part of the New York State budget, passed under the leadership of Governor Kathy Hochul. The League had lobbied for this renewal of the credit, a program that began in 2021 under Governor Andrew Cuomo. The state had allocated $100 million to reimburse qualified production costs 25% up to $3 million as a tax credit to productions that applied and were subsequently approved in May 2023, one month before the program was set to expire. It was renewed for two years to June 30, 2025, and the aggregate funds increased to $300 million. Finally, just a few months ago, it was extended until June 30, 2027, with the aggregate amount raised to $400 million. Essentially, the state government had begun by adding $100 million each year to the pool of funds from which producers would be reimbursed as long as they were approved. But with the most recent renewals, the governor allocated an additional $100 million for two years rather than $100 million for each additional year, if that makes sense. So not only did the industry receive less money per year from the last renewal renewal, but the league and individual producers didn't know how much money remained in the fund from previous years. Additionally, they go on to suggest that the $100 million was actually calculated based on pre Covid budgets, which obviously have now increased dramatically, so it may not even be fit for purpose. And true enough, it has been reported that the money available for reimbursement has now run out. There are productions in the 2025-2026 season that had anticipated being able to apply for the credit that now cannot. The league and many industry leaders are now lobbying the state to renew the program in the upcoming budget rather than in 2027, but with some changes, all of which are extensively covered in this brilliant piece and the details of which I won't go into now. But that is a really big and troubling component of the current financial challenges faced by Broadway productions. And you may be asking, given that all of this is happening, how does that affect Broadway? Well, let's take a look. Now, a few months ago I shared a brief early overview of the shows that had already been announced for the upcoming 2025-26 Broadway season, and I remarked that there wasn't a plethora of new musicals. And that has also been noticed by Michael Paulson in the New York Times. He said last season, 14 new musicals opened on Broadway. This season there seemed likely to be about half that number and many more will announce before the end of the season. Many will arrive last minute in the spring, as they always do, but certainly it seems as though it is going to be fewer than we had in the most recent Broadway season, which may also be for the best. Michael also expl explains here how some producers believe the number of financial disappointments has been higher over the last two seasons because there was an oversupply of new musicals after the pandemic shutdown. Basically, a backlog of shows built up when Broadway was closed, leading to more shows opening than audiences could support. Mike Rigo, one of the lead producers of the Outsiders, is quoted as saying, when every theater on Broadway is full, there are reasons to celebrate, but also if we don't have enough audience, it's the opposite of helpful. Anecdotally, it has been said to me before by individuals who have worked in Broadway ticketing for a really long time, we are talking decades, that there are simply not enough audiences at any given time to sustain every theatre on Broadway being full simultaneously, which is a level that it approaches at the height of Tony eligibility season in the early spring. So while it's a great thing when there are no dark theatres whatsoever, there aren't enough audience members to help support all of these shows, and some of them are inevitably going to struggle. And investors pay attention to these realities and producers pay attention to these realities. So when you get a season like the most recent one with so many struggling new musicals and Tony Award winning new musicals, even that don't become profitable and financially successful during their time on Broadway, people are less enthusiastic about financially supporting new musicals going forwards. What are they excited to support? They're excited to support the shows that are printing money, which are the star led plays and play revivals. Yes, if we glance back at the last season and take that as an indicator, we had this extraordinary quality of new musical theater writing, but those shows have yet to become profitable. And the shows that recouped during their limited runs on Broadway were the likes of Good Night and Good Luck starring George Clooney at the Winter Garden, Othello starring Jake Gyllenhaal and Denzel Washington. Why have one star celebrity name driving up ticket prices when you can have two? Glengarry Glen Ross, the Picture of Dorian Gray. Yay for shows like Succession, casting these really fantastic actors, giving these intense theatrical performances who then go to the stage after that TV show ends and can command massive ticket prices. But if you thought Broadway had been reliant on celebrity in the past, get ready for that to only feel more and more apparent. We are already seeing it in the upcoming season. There are multiple star led plays coming in and the likes of Giant starring John Lithgow is, I am hearing, much more popular among investors than a host of new musicals which I have such utter mixed feelings about. And I think it's exciting on the one hand when plays become the hot ticket of Broadway because they are often neglected alongside the shiny and flashier musicals. But as the Broadway League have pointed out in that New York Times piece, the Broadway musical is also the lifeblood of the industry and they need those long running Broadway musicals. They need the Hamiltons, they need the Lion Kings to help to support the entire industry and the entire ecosystem. Those limited run plays aren't doing it even if they are making a lot of money during their time on Broadway. For what it's worth, what we're not really seeing is a move towards the commercial in terms of the quality. Even though Patti LuPone keeps calling Broadway a circus and an amusement park. And even though you have the occasional back to the future, for the most part, I think we are still seeing really brilliant writing even in the face of such financial uncertainty. Look at the most recent season with maybe Happy Ending and Dead Outlaw and Operation Mincemeat. These plucky little shows are still making their way to the biggest stages on Earth. And you have to applaud that. And not for nothing, Broadway audiences, to their immense credit, don't respond to these obviously commercial shows. I've said this many, many times. But the likes of Pretty Woman and Miss Doubtfire and I suppose even Back to the Future ran considerably longer in the UK and had considerably more success over here than they ever did in New York. But it does seem a reality that we are seeing fewer new musicals on Broadway, which perhaps is a good thing. You know, the shows are still being written, but if they're produced a little more sparsely, then each has a little more room to be celebrated and really be seen. Dead Outlaw deserved far better than it got on Broadway. In any other year, that probably would have been a Tony Award winning best new Musical. I mean, several of the shows shows last season could have been, but they were facing such intense massive competition. It sometimes gives me pause to consider that the exact timing of when a show decides to run on Broadway can affect the trajectory of its entire lifespan. If Dead Outlaw had become a Tony Award winning Best New Musical, would a tour have been more feasible? Would there be more regional productions? Would that show become more widespread and well known? How much is the entire lifetime of a piece of theater affected by the exact moment when it chooses to press premiere? I think in the world of new playwriting, we are also still seeing very bold work, but we are seeing a lot of it happening in Off Broadway venues. And we are also perhaps troublingly seeing star celebrity casting trickling down into some of those smaller Off Broadway venues as well. I'm sort of looking at you, John Krasinski over at Studio Seaview. I'm looking at you as well, Hugh Jackman. I know that was part of an affordable ticketing initiative, but these are all little symptoms of the bigger financial problem that's happening. And it's also I guess in some ways some kind of a seesaw effect. If Broadway is becoming less safe when it comes to producing bold and exciting new work, that work is still going to go somewhere because theatre people are still plucky and inspired and will still find a way to get that work onto a stage. So it might just be that we begin to see more and more bold and exciting work happening off Broadway or in London. I cannot tell you how many producers and investors from the us, from the New York are working in the UK right now. And we are having a lot of exciting things happening because they have turned their attention across the Atlantic to a place where a revival like Evita can recoup even during a limited summer run. But speaking of Evita, and even though no Jamie Lloyd directed production I believe has yet to become profitable on Broadway, I do think that we are also beginning to sense the Jamie Lloydification of certain musical revivals and the popularization of the musical revival as a concept this season alone. Even though we don't have a lot of new musicals happening on Broadway, we have Ragtime and the Rocky Horror show and Chess coming up and Dreamgirls on the horizon, even these sort of Broadway tour stop productions for Mamma Mia. And Beetlejuice. It seems that familiarity and nostalgia is what producers are leaning into at the moment. Certainly it's an easier way to build a musical's brand rather than trying to establish something completely new like a maybe happy ending, like a dead end outlaw. And while we haven't yet seen what this production of Chess is going to look like, everything that I am hearing about it makes it sound as though it is kind of in response to those Jamie Lloyd esque productions. And Sunset was a huge cultural moment in New York and on Broadway. It was a Tony Award winning success. It didn't recoup its initial investment costs, but it wasn't as significant a financial loss as a handful of other productions. And certainly there is a lot about it, giant screen and celebrity casting notwithstanding, that makes it look from the outside to be a more profitable way of producing a musical revival. And while we could keep overanalyzing and predicting the ways in which this might affect the work that is being produced on Broadway, we also have to think about the way that this is going to impact individuals. Which brings me to another piece of particularly unfortunate timing, which is the expiry of the production contract and the possibility of an imminent Actors Equity association strike. Yes, there might be a Broadway actors strike in the near future. To elucidate a little, here is a post that has been shared on Instagram by Actors Equity and Equity United Official Very down with the kids are we. In response to the question what does it mean when the production contract expires? They said this the production contract expired on September 28th. Now that the production contract is expired, many of the terms and conditions of your employment, including your wages and work rules, remain in effect until a new one is negotiated and ratified. This addressed to actors working as part of the Equity union. But one main difference between an active and expired contract is this. With an expired contract, which it now is as of the last few days, the no strike clause is no longer in effect for production shows produced by members of the Broadway League, which means that they can now call a strike if they wish to, which gives them an awful lot more bargaining power when it comes to negotiations, which they explain here. They go on to say, if negotiations stall and progress is not being made at the table, Equity can call for a strike. Strikes are always considered the last resort. There are many other ways union members can exhibit their unity and strength. Before we get to that point, two days ago they acknowledged this and they said, we hear the question on everyone's lips, is Equity going on strike? You'd have to ask the Broadway League. Our answer really depends on them. We have mutually agreed to two days of mediation next week. In the meantime, we're going to make sure that we're all doing what we can as a union to prepare should a strike become necessary to get a fair contract. And here at Mickey Joe Theatre, we are firmly in support of unions. We are firmly of, in support, support of individuals. We talk about the theatre industry and we talk about shows like Their People and we've been talking about producers and investors, like their financial positions are the most challenged in this landscape, which they aren't. The reality is that it's the individuals who work for them who are working in the theatre, not just on stage, but also backstage, also outside of the theatre. The people who make up this industry and actually make sure that the show can go on every single night on Broadway are the, the ones who are going to be struggling the most in the face of financial hardships and show closures. Like, there's a human element to all of this conversation as well. When we talk about more shows closing than usual, prematurely, shows having shorter runs, like a lot of wealthy investors have potentially lost tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of dollars. Show budgets that were tens of millions haven't been recouped. But you also have actors potentially losing their access to health insurance, insurance. So I do feel it's important to talk about Equity and to talk about actors here to gain a little perspective on this entire situation. And if they call for a strike, then I will support that. As devastating as it may be for the immediate future of a handful of Broadway shows, I think there are a bunch that wouldn't necessarily survive any kind of an extended Equity strike related shutdown. But that, if anything, should be a motivator to the producers of those shows and to the Broadway League to meet actors at the table and engage in negotiations. Negotiations. The hope is that this gives them enough bargaining power to achieve a fantastic new deal and we don't have to resort to the last Resort, which is an Actors Equity association strike, which is not beneficial for the Broadway League, for the Broadway community, or for audiences frankly, but which may ultimately be necessary for the ongoing welfare of actors, which is something that we have to prioritize. We have to think about the human beings here that make up these shows. Because Hamilton isn't Hamilton without a cast on stage. It's just a lot of wood paneling and some turntables, I promise you. Not nearly as satisfying. That wasn't meant to be a pun. But it was. And on that front, though, it makes me very nervous when it comes to the possibility of an Actors Equity association strike. This is something that I will continue to cover if this story develops, in spite of the fact that my one voice on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean is not that significant a show of support, but because I think that supporting the workers and supporting the unions is always the right thing thing to do. At which point you may be asking the question what can we do? And I suppose the short answer to that this week feels like go buy a sandwich for a working actor. And the other answer feels a little bit disingenuous because in all of this what we need is for audiences to be buying tickets. And that's not one individual. That's something that needs to be happening en masse. And that doesn't just mean bullying people who can't necessarily afford to into paying for expensive tickets to Broadway shows and shaming them for not being able to spend more money on entertainment. Entertainment. It means helping to facilitate Broadway and live theater and the brilliance of it and the inspiration of it reaching a wider audience. That's something that you can do. That's something you can participate in on social media. If there is a Broadway show that you are excited about and I share a review of it here on YouTube, then you can help that to reach more people. But this isn't just about me. You can do that with show's own social media posts super easily. You can just like a reel that they've created and that tells the algorithm, algorithm on Instagram, on tick tock, wherever it is to help to boost that piece of content. Here's a wacky idea and I haven't spoken about this at length because I don't generally like to talk about what other content creators are doing on social media. Everybody does different things. But how about we don't uplift and support content that deliberately spoils embargoed announcements that deliberately spills tea about upcoming Broadway productions? Because the surprise factor of those announcements surprise Surprise. Chess revival is happening. Surprise. This person's doing Rocky Horror is a big element of the marketing strategy, because when that gets announced and you don't know that it's happening and you're surprised, guess what you do? You react to it. You comment, you share it, you send it to a friend and go, oh, my gosh. But if you've already seen a TikTok saying that that's coming, instead you just go to the group WhatsApp and you're like, yep, that was right. It's been announced today. And that means they don't get the engagement, they don't get the shares, and it dramatically decreases the. The reach on all of their social posts and all of the content that is spilling tea about these upcoming productions. It may be exciting to feel like you are in the know. I get that, believe me. But you are actually damaging the impact and the reach of the social media of all of these shows. And social media has become a hugely important marketing tool for Broadway in ways that it is only recently beginning to realize. And as I talk to you right here, whether it's on YouTube or on podcast platforms, you are clearly someone who engages with theatre content on social media media. And that, I think, is the easiest thing that you can do. That I can do, that we can all do to help support Broadway. If you see a fantastic piece of theater, talk about it, tell a friend, share it online, go to that show's page and support them. Theatre is difficult to make anywhere around the world, not just on Broadway. Celebrate the pieces of theatre that you love, that you are inspired by. Help them to grow even bigger and to become successful. No one is making theater to make a vast amount of money. Investors are not investing in the theater to make money. They know that it's a gamble. They know that it's a foolish investment. Most of the time they are doing it for the love of the art because they think that it is important, because they know that it is culturally and personally important. Before I start crying like I'm actually at a Broadway funeral right now, I think that is everything that I have to say for now about the possibility of further financial turmoil on Broadway. This hopefully has been just a little bit of an insight. You can go and read those pieces that I was quoting from. You can get. Go and read about the tax program changing. You can go and read the brilliant pieces in the New York Times. I encourage you to do so. And you, of course, can stay tuned for further updates from me about all of these developing stories. If there is more to talk about. You can bet that I will be talking about it right here on social media. Make sure you're subscribed, following me, turn on the notifications, do whatever you have to to make sure that you don't miss it. In the meantime, I would love to hear what you think, particularly if you have anything encouraging to to share in the comments section down below or any insights that I didn't talk about. There's more that I think that I wanted to say that I probably forgot in the heat of the moment and because this has already been quite long and I'll be honest with you, it's one o' clock in the morning. But please do share your thoughts down below. And as always, I hope that everyone is staying safe and that you have a stagey day. For 10 more seconds, I'm Mickey Jo Theatre. Oh my God. Hey, thanks for watching. Have a stagey day. Subscribe.