Broadway Is ‘Frozen’ By The Pandemic, And Live Entertainment’s Future Looks Chilly As Well

Summer looms, and for those who had hoped for some return to normalcy — baseball games, movies, trips to New York City to see well, anything — those hopes appear dashed to a large measure. In New York City, Broadway’s shutdown portends a series of ripple effects, all of them massive headwinds for travel and tourism — specifically hotels, restaurants and airlines.

And now, there’s at least one bona fide casualty on the Great White Way. Word recently emerged that the musical “Frozen,” based on the 2013 Walt Disney Co. animated film, won’t return even after Broadway reopens at some point in the future.

It’s the first Broadway production to go dark permanently in the pandemic’s wake. Thomas Schumacher, president and producer of Disney Theatrical Productions, blamed the closing on the “industrywide shutdown and resulting economic fallout.”

Broadway.com reported that the production opened a bit more than two years ago in March 2018 and ran for 825 performances until March 11. During that time, “Frozen” grossed more than $150 million across 1.3 million tickets sold.

Disney Theatrical Productions is part of Walt Disney Studios, and Disney doesn’t break out the specific contribution of the musical (or the entire theatrical group itself). However, it should be noted that in the latest quarter, Walt Disney Studios contributed $2.5 billion in revenue, or 13.9 percent of Walt Disney Co.’s consolidated $18 billion.

The overall company is still largely in a holding pattern — especially its Parks, Experiences and Products segment, which accounted for $5.5 billion, or 30.5 percent of the top line. As noted in this space last week, Disney has been in the midst of a measured reopening of its parks.

As a first step, the company opened Shanghai Disneyland but limited visitors to less than 30 percent of previous capacity. It’s also checking guests’ temperatures and mandating social distancing. The segment’s results were down 10 percent year on year during the latest quarter, but that only reflected the partial impact from the pandemic’s early days.

On the plus side, there’s at least one move that hints at cross-pollination potential. Disney said that it’s moving up release of its filmed version of the blockbuster Broadway show “Hamilton.” The company will make a streamed version available across Disney+ beginning July 3, whereas the theatrical release had been slated for October 2021.

This shows how flexible media can be. Disney (and presumably other media conglomerates) can pivot content across digital channels, at least partially offsetting the impact to brick-and-mortar operations.

But for New York City’s economy, the impact of Broadway’s temporary shuttering through at least Labor Day will have a big ripple effect. The Broadway League has estimated that during the 2018/2019 season, total attendance was 14.8 million people, grossing $1.8 billion. And that tally doesn’t take into account ancillary spending across hotels, retailers, restaurants and public transport (or Uber drivers).

And on a larger stage (pun partly intended), the question is: What happens if (or perhaps when) the shift away from attending live events becomes permanent?

As PYMNTS detailed on Monday (May 18), we surveyed 2,047 U.S. consumers about how the pandemic has impacted their routines. We found that 38.1 percent of consumers earning more than $100,000 per year are among those most likely to have gone online for daily life — and that 34.2 percent of those earning between $50,000 and $100,000 have similar inclinations, to live life across digital channels.

The longer the digital shift goes on, the more we might get used to jockeying for the best seats in the house — our house, which in this case means the couch. That means theaters and live shows could continue to face pressure long after the pandemic ends.