'Wicked' Movie Helps Boost Ticket Sales for Live Show, Becoming #1 on Broadway
Wicked has been doing a lot of good. Besides helping break Thanksgiving movie theater box office records and having a soundtrack that's charted on the Billboard 200, the impact of the film has extended into the Broadway world. Namely, it's helped launch the stage play of Wicked as the most popular (no pun intended) Broadway show in New York City.
According to ticketing technology company Victory Live, which evaluates sales data across the secondary market, the Wicked musical has become the highest demand ticket on Broadway. Tickets to Wicked are selling at $312 per ticket on average since the movie was released on November 22 (not including fees). That figure surpasses Hamilton on Broadway, which is going for around $280 per ticket.
And the ticket demand continues to rise; last week's sales reached an all-time high of $338 per ticket for Wicked. During the same week last year, tickets to Wicked were only selling on the secondary market for $166 per ticket.
Morningstar reports that for the seven-day period ending December 2 – which was Thanksgiving week, typically one of Broadway's busiest – Wicked was the best-selling production, grossing $2.93 million. That put it ahead of theatrical juggernauts like The Lion King ($2.88 million) and Hamilton ($2.58 million). It also put it ahead of newer shows, including last season's Tony Award-winner for Best Musical, The Outsiders ($1.84 million).
And Wicked, the live show, has become far more than a New York phenomenon. Since its inception, the theatrical event has grossed $6 billion worldwide, including global productions, according to NBCUniversal. The share from the Broadway production is about $1.7 billion – around a quarter of that total.
Theater-industry professionals say the effect of the movie is impossible to ignore – and will have a lasting impact on the musical. "It gave the show so much free advertising," said Alan Seales, co-founder of the Broadway Podcast Network.
Interestingly, Marc Platt, a former Universal executive who served as one of the producers of the show and now of the movie, originally conceived Wicked as a cinematic project, not a theatrical one. He optioned the Gregory Maguire novel with a film in mind. But he couldn't get the project past the screenplay stage. That is, until legendary composer Stephen Schwartz approached him with the idea of Wicked as a Broadway musical instead.
"And the lightbulb went off in my head," Platt said in a recent interview posted on the NBCUniversal site. "I thought, 'That's what's been missing from these screenplays. I don't feel the magic because it's a story that wants to sing.'"
Ready to see the magic of Wicked for yourself? You can find tickets to the movie version here, and tickets to the stage play here.
Watch the trailers for the Wicked Broadway show and Wicked movie below.
READ NEXT: Broadway Star Gavin Creel Dies at 48
Discover thousands of free stations from every genre of music and talk at Live365.com.
Rather listen on our app? Download the Live365 app on iOS or Android. Ready to start your own station? Contact one of our Product Consultants or visit our website today. Keep up with the latest news by following us on Facebook (Live365 (Official) and Live365 Broadcasting) and Twitter (@Live365 and @Broadcast365)! You can also shop Live365 swag and branded merchandise at store.live365.com.
Article Image: The "Wicked" marquee on the front of the Oriental Theater in Chicago. (bradleypjohnson [CC BY 2.0] via Wikimedia Commons)