To think that West End Theatre is going to perish due to over pricing?

[VanCleefArpels]

Elf the Musical is back for the festive season. Fabulous! Let’s book……

Stalls seats £295/300
Circle seats £200 / £250

With train fares (not far away commuter belt) plus maybe a quick pizza afterwards a family of four will be spending a four figure sum for a night at the theatre. The best part of a month’s salary for many ordinary people.

How can this be sustainable?

IABU - suck it up, it’s not compulsory
IANBU - this kind of pricing will be the death of West End Theatre

there are 241 theatres in London alone

in 2023 more than 17 MILLION tickets were sold in the west end - so that's just the ticket sales for 39 of those 241 theatres, and doesn't even cover venues like the Globe, Old Vic, National, Barbican, Royal opera house, etc., before you even start going off-west end, let alone outside of London.

I don't think you know what 'elitist,' means. It isn't 'incredibly popular and common.'

Currently sitting in Leeds arena to see simply red tickets for two of us 170 pounds and with parking and food before coming in talking 200 pounds for a night out yes it's not cheap nowadays but for me worth it

Worth mentioning that the Donmar Warehouse do standing tickets for £15. They’re not suitable for everyone, but I’ve seen several amazing productions that way and had good views. Even the top price tickets are a relatively cheap £70.

Was talking to a friend about football match prices recently, and was astonished at the cost.

If they are still selling seats at these prices then no it won’t perish. The West End is a destination - very different from theatres in towns.

If you don't live locally, it can be hard to be flexible about dates. However, you can still get cheap tickets by being flexible about what you see

I went to London with a friend, tickets were expensive when we looked and there wasn't one show we had in mind that we had to see, so I got tickets on the day to one of the few we'd chosen. I paid £25 on the day for amazing seats to The Book Of Mormon

Actually ended up getting both for £25 as I asked for seats that are accessible in the stalls as we are both disabled, and he said I could be eligible for a carers ticket, which I was. So I only paid for one ticket, but before he said that I had thought £25 each was an amazing price for the seats he showed me, and was more than happy to pay that for each of us.

Wouldn't have had better seats if I paid top price, so although our date wasn't flexible as we had both travelled in, having flexibility with what we watched worked great. There are so many amazing shows in London, that it's easy to be flexible with which you watch