Thank you. In some of the post-Covid conversations about the return of Broadway last season, I repeatedly ran into these odd "maybe now we can get rid of all those tourists!" As if Broadway's relaunch would be some pure artistic iteration without attention paid to the industry's needs. Even thoughtful people voiced, "no more Phantoms and Cats!" As if that solved some amorphous aesthetic crisis, i.e. that only cream would rise to the top, that it would be affordable, and that only people in the tri-state area would be the new ticket buyers. It happened more than once, and last summer, in my own family, someone hoping "nothing ever runs a long time again."
Whatever one thinks of long runs, they are (also) the backbone of one of New York's signature calling cards. I just watched a fairly new Lion King spot, with a woman taking her daughter, and then meeting a friend or relative afterward. A sense of delight permeates. It is a bald commercial ploy that moved me to tears. It's quite possible for the intersection of art and commerce to create something that still delivers wonder. Watch any show with a spellbound child - from NJ or British Columbia or Japan -- and note the way Broadway's tourists will always at least partially define the NY theater experience. |
