The country of Australia is in need of some major financial taxpayer assistance after a mass exodus of large-scale performance pieces.
In the timeframe of two weeks, two major musicals and an ambitious $20 million opera production cut their Australian tours short citing the cause of cancellation as being skyrocketing costs and soft box office sales.
The latest production to cut and run is the touring production of Waitress starring Rob Mills and Natalie Bassingthwaighte. Announcing on June 28, that the show will not go on. It will instead end in Melbourne on July 19 rather than follow through with its initial plan to continue to Sydney.
The Crossroads Live Australia chief executive, John Frost, who produced Waitress, says in a statement that “whilst audience enthusiasm for our work remained strong, attendance levels and box office have not been sufficient to support the cost of the production”
This follows the early departure of Beetlejuice: The Musical which will end in Brisbane this upcoming Sunday, July 5. The production leaves behind a trail of heartbroken theatre goers, cancelling upcoming performances in Sydney, Perth, and Adelaide.
Beetlejuice’s production company, Michael Cassel Group, say in a statement that “for a production of this scale, the current logistical realities of touring across vast distances between Australian cities have created increasing cost pressures that ultimately made continuing the run unsustainable.
“While audience enthusiasm for the show has been encouraging, a more cautious consumer environment combined with the economics of moving a production of this magnitude could not be justified. It is a difficult decision, and not one we made lightly.”
Both productions have cited multiple factors including rising production costs, the costs of touring, cost-of-living pressures such as raising interest rates that were affecting sales, and lower consumer confidence changing ticket-buying behaviors.
The beginning of the end occurred this past Friday, June 26, when an ambitious $20 million production of Verdi’s Aida cancelled its upcoming performances at the Adelaide Oval. The production stated that “skyrocketing international shipping and freight costs, compounded by global supply-chain disruptions and the Middle East conflict, made it mathematically impossible to stage profitably, even with a complete sellout.” This is despite the show having already sold 17,000 tickets for the February 2027 shows.
TEG Live’s head of touring, Claudia Coffey, told ABC Adelaide that the company lost $2 million and five years of work by cancelling Aida now, but “bringing 400 people and 28 containers became totally untenable”, adding “if we sold every single ticket to the show with the increased freight costs and travel costs, we would be at a loss”.
These actions will lead to a major unemployment spike for Australian theatre workers with the venues that would be housing the cancelled productions going dark for the next 30 to 40 weeks.
“Hundreds of people will be out of work, from performers and musicians to wardrobe, wigs, makeup, stage technicians, administrators, ushers and bar staff,” states Graeme Kearns, CEO of Foundation Theatres, the company that runs both theatres that would have housed Waitress and Beetlejuice, “It will be a very difficult six months ahead of us all. We will, of course, try to find alternatives for the theatres but, with short lead times and tough economic conditions, that will be very difficult to achieve.”
Suzanne Jones, the CEO of Jones Theatrical Group, which is currently staging the musicals Pretty Woman and The Book of the Mormon in Australia, and Mrs. Doubtfire at the end of 2026, says major musicals needed more than just sales.
“The market is there but the costs are rising faster than the ticket prices are, and that’s just a squish,” she says. “Freight costs, labor costs—all of those things are going up at a greater rate than ticket sales are.”
Other musicals that have recently cut their tours short include Back to the Future and Dear Evan Hansen, the latter calling off scheduled Canberra and Adelaide performances due to low ticket sales.
Photo courtesy of Unsplash
