To think £17 for a children's show is a lot?

[Supermagicsmile]

My niece is in an ameteur production at the theatre (all children/teens) and we would love to go and see her in it. The tickets are £17 for adults and £15 for children which means it would cost my family £94 to go and watch her.
AIBU to that's very expensive for such a production? Those are the sort do prices we pay for the Christmas panto with famous people in it.

That seems pretty normal, you have to remember that theatre hire, sets etc are all very expensive. The will also need tech crew with various qualifications in order to be able to leagally run the show and they will probably want to be paid.

YANBU. A local AmDram group is doing Hairspray and I really wanna go see it but the prices are similar. I want to support local arts groups but they don’t make it easy charging that kind of price. I know they have to cover costs though and not sure ho much profit (if any) they make

That does seem expensive. Locally a group do a pant which the kids can audition to take part in and tickets are £5.

I would have to disagree with the PP and say that's quite a lot - at amateur productions here tickets are usually £10-£12 at most.

Is it a particularly prestigious youth theatre group?

No it's not! (Well not that I am aware of no!)

Our local pantomime costs a lot more than that! I think those prices are normal these days unfortunately.

A local theatre will have all the associated costs to pay in the same way a national threatre will have costs. Rates, electric, production costs, props, costumes printing etc don't magically halve because they are being used by amateurs.

I think it's quite expensive seeing I have seen professional shows like Joseph for £12 and saw The Band Musical for £19.50 I stalls a few weeks ago.

Do they have their own small theatre or are they hiring a proper theatre? If so it might just be the cost of hiring or maybe they are fundraising.

I understand that there are a lot of costs involved but I would still say that's a high price for an amateur youth production. I'd have thought they'd try to get the costs down because I can't see them selling many tickets to the general public at that price - DD's boyfriend used to help with lighting for a theatre near us and tickets to the youth production cost £8 for adults and £6 concessions.

Normal pricing imo but it’s not normal to expect extended family- aunties and such to go and see, sounds like it’s the sort of thing one or two parents might go to, perhaps a sibling if they were particularly keen to.

Those prices are perfectly reasonable I'm afraid given the costs involved. The theatre group I am involved with costs nearly £40,000 to put on a show for a week. This is for rights, musicians, sets, sound, lights, costumes, rehearsal venue. All the helpers are volunteers. It is at a "proper" theatre and we make no profit. Theatres charge a massive amount to use their facilities and it makes no difference whether it is adults or children.

Tbh it’s reasonable. I pay £10 for a professional kids’ show. Each seat is subsidised by about £30 from the arts council.

I used to be in an amateur theatre group (very well thought of, won awards at festivals etc.) and we charged £6.00 per ticket.

We ended up with no money, unable to afford rehearsal space and now the group no longer exists even after we tried funding ourselves for a while.

I think that people expect not to have to pay very much but still want quality set dressing and costumes and it's impossible.

If you can't afford it then of course that's fair enough, but I think it's a reasonable price.