Wicked Achieves Highest Weekly Gross in West End Theatre History
The new musical wicked has become London's top grossing musical, with record-breaking attendance figures and ticket sales. WICKED set a new Box Office record during previews at the Apollo Victoria Theatre and has continued to set new ones ever since. Last week (ending 28 October 2006), WICKED grossed over three quarters of a million pounds (£761,125) at the Box Office, higher than any other West End show currently running and the highest weekly 8 performance Box Office gross in West End theatre history. Over 18,000 people attended the show. Since its first public performance on 7 September 2006, musical wicked has already been seen by over 130,000 people, averaging just over 95% attendances in its 2304-seat theatre. Since opening night (27 September 2006), the weekly Box Office gross has been higher than any other West End show. For the month of October (4 weeks) WICKED has grossed nearly £2.5 million. Based on the best-selling novel by Gregory Maguire, WICKED tells the untold story of the Witches of Oz, and how one came to be called 'good' and the other 'wicked.' WICKED stars Idina Menzel as Elphaba, Helen Dallimore as Glinda, Adam Garcia as Fiyero, Miriam Margolyes as Madame Morrible, Nigel Planer as The Wizard, Martin Ball as Doctor Dillamond, James Gillan as Boq and Katie Rowley Jones as Nessarose. From January 2007 the role of Elphaba will be played by Kerry Ellis.
The hit musical wicked, at London's Apollo Victoria Theatre, has dominated the Whatsonstage.com Theatregoers'Choice Awards 2007, winning 4 awards: Best New Musical, Best Set Design (Eugene Lee), Best Supporting Actress in a Musical (Miriam Margolyes) and Best Actress in a Musical (Idina Menzel) Over 12,000 members of the theatregoing public cast their online votes with the musical wicked winning all of its nominated categories. The musical averaged over 51% of the total votes cast in its nominated categories and also won more awards than any other production.
"On behalf of my colleagues Marc Platt and David Stone and everyone at Universal, I'd like to thank all the theatregoers who voted for Wicked and to offer my personal congratulations to Stephen Schwartz, Winnie Holzman and our superbly talented London cast...." Michael McCabe, Executive Producer.
Whatsonstage.com is the UK's biggest performing arts website and this year celebrates its 10th birthday. The Whatsonstage.com Theatregoers'Choice Awards are now in their fifth year.
"Wicked" has been playing long enough for it's first- (and second-) string stars to have moved on, but not long enough for audiences to have forgotten them. The current stars, Megan Hilty and Shoshana Bean, seem tentative onstage, devoid of idiosyncrasies. Ms. Hilty adds a bit of a goofy charm to the perfect Glinda, but she can't seem to locate the jokes in her lines or find the lift in the bouncy tune "Popular." Ms. Bean, who has a precise and impressive singing voice, is more believable as an outcast than Idina Menzel, but her characterization is generic, which also could be said of David Ayers, who plays the love interest of both witches, Fiyero. Rue McClanahan is doing maaahvelous things with vowel sounds as Madam Morrible; Ben Vereen makes a convincingly broken-down Wizard. (Read Ben Brantley's review of the original Broadway cast.)
The hit musical wicked, at London's Apollo Victoria Theatre, has dominated the Whatsonstage.com Theatregoers'Choice Awards 2007, winning 4 awards: Best New Musical, Best Set Design (Eugene Lee), Best Supporting Actress in a Musical (Miriam Margolyes) and Best Actress in a Musical (Idina Menzel) Over 12,000 members of the theatregoing public cast their online votes with the musical wicked winning all of its nominated categories. The musical averaged over 51% of the total votes cast in its nominated categories and also won more awards than any other production.
"On behalf of my colleagues Marc Platt and David Stone and everyone at Universal, I'd like to thank all the theatregoers who voted for Wicked and to offer my personal congratulations to Stephen Schwartz, Winnie Holzman and our superbly talented London cast...." Michael McCabe, Executive Producer.
Whatsonstage.com is the UK's biggest performing arts website and this year celebrates its 10th birthday. The Whatsonstage.com Theatregoers'Choice Awards are now in their fifth year.
"Wicked" has been playing long enough for it's first- (and second-) string stars to have moved on, but not long enough for audiences to have forgotten them. The current stars, Megan Hilty and Shoshana Bean, seem tentative onstage, devoid of idiosyncrasies. Ms. Hilty adds a bit of a goofy charm to the perfect Glinda, but she can't seem to locate the jokes in her lines or find the lift in the bouncy tune "Popular." Ms. Bean, who has a precise and impressive singing voice, is more believable as an outcast than Idina Menzel, but her characterization is generic, which also could be said of David Ayers, who plays the love interest of both witches, Fiyero. Rue McClanahan is doing maaahvelous things with vowel sounds as Madam Morrible; Ben Vereen makes a convincingly broken-down Wizard. (Read Ben Brantley's review of the original Broadway cast.)
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