Every week we will be sharing John and Stephen Hauge’s TheaterThoughts from their popular site TrueTheatergoer.
“From John Hauge: “My brother Stephen and I created the TrueTheatergoer.com website in October 2011 to promote theater in Washington, DC and on Broadway by providing an enriching collection of information on current shows and composite audience reviews and ratings of these shows. Our hope is to further develop a community excited about theater and willing to write short comments of shows so others can benefit from their experiences.”
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REVIEW AND RATE THE SHOWS YOU HAVE SEEN AND WIN $100.00!
Review and rate the shows you have seen and you have a chance to win $100 worth of Tix Certificates, which you can use to buy tickets to several theatres in the DC Metro Area.
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This Week’s TheaterThoughts: Standing Room
Currently seven Broadway shows (Chicago, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Mamma Mia!, Matilda, Newsies, The Book of Mormon and The Phantom of the Opera) offer “standing room.” This practice generally means that if a show is sold out, a person in the waiting line may purchase a place to stand (behind the orchestra seats) to watch the show. (The number of persons so enabled is limited by the number of places to stand.)
Having stood in such a line last night, your reporter can say that the experience of talking with fellow theater-goers was marvelous, full of rich stories of performances seen and of those warmly remembered.
If the show is not sold out, however, (last night’s had 12 seats left), theaters do not sell “standing room” tickets. On the surface this seems logical: why discount an available seat (say, $145) to a “standing room” space (say, $27)?
Yet the clientele in the line is clearly different. After all, if a person wanted to spend $145, he or she would buy a seat, if available. The standee typically does not want to or cannot spend the extra money, so relies on “standing room,” especially when the rear mezzanine and balcony seats are sold out.
The result is no revenue from the empty expensive seats and none from the empty “standing room” spaces. To what purpose? Every show can benefit from the extra word of mouth as well as the good will generated by fervent theater-goers willing to spend up to five hours in line — and then stand for 90 to 150 minutes to see the show.
So Broadway management: please reconsider this policy, and encourage theater-going by broadening its reach.
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AND GO IN AND VOTE FOR YOUR CHOICES FOR THE HELEN HAYES AWARDS, AND YOU CAN WIN $200.00!
When you have reviewed both lists, please look directly above for the Award Ballot, click on it, and choose your winners in these categories.
The voter with the highest correct total will win $200.
All ballots must be submitted electronically by April 18th.
