Riverdance chief warned 90% of live shows don’t make money
RIVERDANCE producer Julian Erskine warned that nine of out ten live shows don’t make money, and disagreed with former business co-creator Moya Doherty that ‘industry norms’ didn’t apply to RTE.
Mr Erskine, who was the senior executive producer of Riverdance for 26 years, served as a consultant producer on RTÉ’s Toy Show – The Musical, where he raised red flags over the commercial risk of theatre ventures, and musicals in particular.
Mr Erskine also enquired about pulling the show just days after it was launched in May 2022 after ‘disappointing’ ticket sales. RTÉ needed to sell 75,411 tickets to break even, but only sold 11,044.
At a meeting of RTÉ executive management and the team behind the musical, Mr Erskine warned ‘nine out of ten musicals don’t make their money back’. He noted the industry norm for entertainment ventures to break even was around 55% of ticket sales. However, Toy Show – The Musical needed to sell 70% of tickets to break even. ‘In my book, 70% is an unacceptably high level of commercial risk,’ he told auditors at Grant Thornton, which investigated the commercial flop for RTÉ.
But ultimately the auditors indicated that the show would not break even from the outset.
The auditors stated that at a presentation at the RTE executive board meeting held on March 1, 2022, it showed 44 shows with a 80% break even projection, whilst the presentation to the combo meeting – a meeting of the RTE board and its directors – on March 29, 2022, showed 54 shows with a 70% break even.
But Grant Thornton stated: ‘In respect of tickets sales, my analysis identifies that at no point in time were there more than 35 shows on sale to the public. I find that the actual levels of ticket sales and this reduced number of shows represented a significant risk that TSTM would not break even.’