Broadway broke its record for the best Thanksgiving week ever this year, with help from shows Come From Away and Hamilton, which both broke individual records last week, as well.
Between Thanksgiving Day Parade tourism and a stacked list of popular shows, Broadway grossed $39.07 million from 31 shows – 10% more than last year’s turkey day total, according to Forbes.
Broadway hit Hamilton alone brought in a whopping $3.45 million, breaking the record for best week from a single show on Broadway. By the end of the holiday season, it could become the first show to ever hit $4 million.
Come From Away, despite its newcomer status, also broke records for its best week ever at the box office and the highest weekly gross income at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre on Broadway with $1.53 million. The record is especially impressive given the show’s unconventional plot – based on the airline passengers who landed unexpectedly on Newfoundland after the attacks on 9/11 – and the fact that the previous record-holder belonged to a celebrity cast of Nathan Lane, Matthew Broderick, Stockard Channing, Rupert Grint and Megan Mullaly in It’s Only a Play.
Other top-sellers lending to Broadway’s success were, of course, Hello, Dolly!, as Bette Midler performs some of her final shows before Bernadette Peters takes over the lead role. The show broke its tenth house record with a weekly gross of $2.47 million. Dear Evan Hansen grossed $1.95m, 42% over its listed potential, despite the recent departure of Tony winner Ben Platt in the lead role.
The family-oriented tourist crowd likely flocked to familiar shows like The Lion King, Wicked, School Of Rock, Phantom Of The Opera and Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, which together added $3.7 million to their tally from the week prior. The Lion King alone broke its own house record for an 8-show week with $2.65 million total gross.
Other record-breakers from the hugely successful week are The Band’s Visit, which jumped $300k from last week to gross $1.31 million, the most ever in the Ethel Barrymore Theatre’s 90-year history, and The Play That Goes Wrong, which had its best week ever at $523k.
