We all want everything to go right the first time, and I even wrote a show about it! However, our first time out frequently fails to meet our expectations. When you first take the field, don’t expect to hit home runs.
Consider yourself a nine-inning baseball player when signing up to invest in Broadway. Don’t worry if you strike out the first time, or even the second and third times; you could still hit a home run in the ninth inning and win the game.
If your first show fails, conduct a retrospective with yourself and the Producer to try to ascertain why it failed. Take what you’ve learned from it and use it in your next outing. Each time, your chances of success should increase. Simply avoid withdrawing from the game.
Rule #5 of Broadway Investing: Examine the Land’s Layout.
The market is impossible to time. However, it is essential to investigate your potential rivals on a playing field as small as Broadway with its limited audience. Are you staging a new musical at the same time as six new musicals open? How do your stars compare to the stars of other shows? Is your play the only classic one? Do you only do comedies? The big TV networks plan their seasons so that they can appeal to all the right people without focusing too much on one kind of show. We can’t work together to program because most producers are independent. However, as an investor, you can look to see if your show will get lost in a sea of similar shows or stand out in a lack of competition without spending $125,000 on New York Times full-page ads.
That’s all there is to it! When I think about making an investment in a Broadway or Off-Broadway show, the five fundamental questions listed above are the first ones I ask myself. When you get into the specifics of the production, such as the budget, the director, etc., you should ask a lot of other questions. However, these will get you started on the path to making a show investment.
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