Spider-Man the Musical’s firm grip sets Broadway record

Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, written by U2's Bono and The Edge, has taken the highest single-week takings of any show in Broadway history.

The musical, which was plagued with problems from its inception, took $2.9m (£1.8m) over nine performances last week, according to The Broadway League. The Edge said it was a “proud day” for everyone who has been involved.

The show, which cost $75m (£48m) to make, is the most expensive Broadway show to be produced.

Bono said,

Things did get chaotic and messy after our producer Tony Adams died. But this week's news has us all giddy again and we are raising our glasses to Tony, to our indefatigable cast, crew, creative – and production team.”

Co-producer Jeremiah Harris admitted he and his colleague, fellow producer Michael Cohl, “came into a very difficult situation” when they signed up.

We've changed the team. We added players when we needed to. We've moved some players around to different positions. And the success we've had here is the culmination of all those people working hard to get done what we've gotten done.”

Half of all attendees to Spider-Man had never been to a Broadway show before, and the production has been seen by more than 600,000 people during the past year.

The musical has beaten the previous record set by Wicked in 2011, which took $2.2m (£1.4m) over an eight-show run in January last year.

via BBC News

Gramilano( Editor )

Graham Spicer is a writer, director and photographer in Milan, blogging (under the name ‘Gramilano') about dance, opera, music and photography for people “who are a bit like me and like some of the things I like”. He was a regular columnist for Opera Now magazine and wrote for the BBC until transferring to Italy.

His scribblings have appeared in various publications from Woman's Weekly to Gay Times, and he wrote the ‘Danza in Italia' column for Dancing Times magazine.