Opening Night - Gielgud

I very rarely click through to tabloid links, but the S*n are claiming that investors are worried they won’t make their money back and are threatening to pull out and therefore forcing it to close. Now I’m no expert, but I’m pretty sure that’s not how theatre investments work…

What's the problem with saying a show is poor if it is? People on this board have been questioning how long it'll last since the first preview so it's not the papers, which came must later, causing the problem, it's the quality of the production. If they were ganging up to close the world's best show then I could see the issue but from the more than 70% 1* and 2* ratings here, that doesn't seem to be the case.

Investors would have invested and paid for the capitalisation of the pre-production costs - so everything before the weekly running costs which is usually covered by ticket sales. That said, if the producers are asking their investors for 'overcall' as the weekly tickets sales aren't covering running costs, that's a different matter (although most investor agreements have clauses against overcall).

I only use the Daily Mail for their showbiz page which is a useful portal to keep up to date with what is going on. The Sun really ceased to be a paper of note several years ago IMO and would never review a show unless there was a "name" in it who probably got their kit off.

The majority of the press is Conservative and the Sun is "persona non gratia" in Liverpool due to their awful reporting of the Hillsborough tragedy. The DM is seen as some hard right paper or maybe that read by the working class hard right. I don't know if it has always been the case. The Express and DM were always pitched between the redtops and the broadsheets historically I thought.

Anyway back to Opening Night if it isn't doing well then surely the wheels would be in motion for it starting to look for a closing date unless there was a decent advance booking or they are shifting a lot of cheap seats. The Frank Farian/Boney M musical was widely panned but it ran for about 6 months so could Opening Night fulfill its run especially with a well known and popular star attached to the show.

Although I didn't like the show, I really do hope that a cast recording emerges. I'm a Rufus Wainwright fan, and I'd like to hear the songs unencumbered from the staging. I don't have high hopes, but I'd like to have the chance to hear the music independently.

Is each tabloid only allowed to report on the bored and disappointed audiences if their publication gave its own scathing review?

Yes, agreed. I’d really like to hear it again, especially the song in Act 1 that was performed as a quartet (almost like two duets juxtaposed against one another). I don’t even know the song name as they weren’t in the programme!

Amazed this hasn’t announced a closing date yet. There’s tumbleweed blowing through that box office.

It's an absolutely stunning song, that says so much by saying so little. Will be on repeat with a cast recording.

Goodness me

Who is that man with bare feet? I don’t like him.

God that's awful, and they all seem embaressed by it. Maybe if they all committed to whatever it is then it wouldn't be so bad, but they all seem low energy and awkward.

And that set, it looks like they've dragged random pieces together rather than a cohesive design. And that curtain looks cheap af!