MY favorite $50 mil lion target is swinging back into view.
“Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” (and bankrupt the theater) will go into rehearsals this summer, begin previews in October and open in November, theater sources say.
And by January, I bet it’ll be the biggest financial disaster in Broadway history.
But I’m getting ahead of myself.
First the news: Patrick Page has been offered the role of the Green Goblin. He’ll replace Alan Cumming, who withdrew from the production a few weeks ago, citing scheduling conflicts.
Page is an old hand at being green and mean. He created the title role in “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas.”
Director Julie Taymor spent the week auditioning actresses to play Mary Jane. Taymor’s first choice, Evan Rachel Wood, withdrew from the production last year, also because of “scheduling conflicts.”
Cute little Reeve Carney is still on board as Spider-Man. I guess he’s the only original cast member with nothing better to do.
As for the money, it is, believe it or not, in place. Michael Cohl, who was brought in by Bono, the show’s composer, to sort out the financial mess, has put up a big chunk of it, and work has resumed at the Hilton Theatre, which has been torn apart to accommodate the gigantic set.
But Cohl doesn’t want to be on the hook for the whole show, so he’s quietly trying to lay off as much of his investment as he can.
If you’re a stage-struck sucker, I hear you can get into “Spider-Man” for about $11 million.
“They’re calling everybody,” says a veteran producer. “They don’t want to carry the whole thing on their backs.”
The finances are, of course, laughable.
The show’s weekly running cost is $850,000. And that’s before royalty payments. Factor those in, and the weekly nut jumps to more than $1 million. A person who’s crunched the numbers says “Spider-Man” will have to run five years — at full capacity, and by selling lots of premium-priced seats — just to earn back the $50 million production cost.
“It’s a fantasy,” this person says. “How many shows sell out every seat at every performance for five straight years?”
Cohl and his co-producers, including Marvel Comics, know this is true. And when they speak to potential suckers — I mean investors — they admit the show is unlikely to pay back on Broadway. But they say they’ll clean up on the road.
Their plan is to launch the show here and then send it out on tour. But it’s not going to play 1,500-seat theaters: It’s going to play 10,000-seat sports arenas.
“They’re trying to sell it as a rock concert,” says a producer. “But you’re not going to sell out a 10,000-seat basketball stadium unless Bono and The Edge are playing the songs. Basically, it’s gotta be a U2 concert. Nobody’s going to sit in nosebleed seats to see a Broadway musical.”
“Spider-Man” collapsed last summer when David Garfinkle, the hapless lead producer, failed to come up with the money. Other, more experienced producers took a look at the show but concluded that the finances were “insane” (as one said at the time) and that, when it came to budget-busting spending, Taymor was worse than Greece.
Not a whole lot has changed since. True, Garfinkle’s been sidelined and Cohl’s now in charge. But even he’s not going to rein in Taymor.
And when “Spider-Man” goes into previews — and once overtime for the hordes of stagehands kicks in — watch that production cost soar to $60 million.
Bono and The Edge better tune up their guitars.