When Two Minus One Equals ZeroWednesday, it was announced that the celebrated
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only has posted its closing notices. But whether its final performance at the
Helen Hayes Theatre falls on November 26 or December 3 depends on immediate box office demand.
Not even a last-minute $2 per seat ploy earlier this week could improve overall ticket sales, which have been stuck in the doldrums from the start. Ironically, even though this show never attracted more than 30% capacity, it received some of the most consistently positive reviews of the year.
Fortunately,
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only will live beyond Broadway as it goes on tour beginning this spring in
Johnson's hometown of Dallas.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.Related Stories:Were Critics Knocking Wood on Two And Only? (September 29, 2006)
A Twofer Opening (September 28, 2006)
Labels: Broadway, Closing Notices, Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, Play
Were Critics Knocking Wood on Two And Only?Last evening, ventriloquist
Jay Johnson opened for his first time on the Great White Way in
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only at the
Helen Hayes Theatre. Were critics engaged? Ventriloquists aren't your typical Broadway fare, but Johnson's performance appears to have struck on positive nerve.
Ben Brantley of
The New York Times is generally positive, noting, "That vulture has terrific timing, as do the tennis ball, the snake, the chimp and the two wooden fellows -- the sweet-spirited Squeaky and the bilious Bob (also a star of “
Soap”) -- that Mr. Johnson brings to flavorful and various comic life with his antic arm and magic voice box. But it’s that little bit of magic that makes the difference. The crack timing is really nobody’s but Mr. Johnson’s, and yet, when it’s time for a comic payoff, his lips remain set in a placid if slightly rigid half-smile, and your eyes are trained on the yapping bird or the monkey or the beady-eyed wooden kid. The nifty trick of talking without appearing to is what raises Mr. Johnson’s act above the level of mere puppetry to something stranger and marginally more fascinating."
In awarding three out of four stars,
Elysa Gardner of
USA Today echoes some of Brantley's fascination: "Johnson's unabashed fervor ultimately proves as engaging as his skill....(His) reminiscences aren't likely to change your life as the events they summon changed Johnson's. But chances are you'll be happy to indulge him."
Joe Dziemianowicz of New York's
Daily News gushes, "You expect to laugh during a show about a guy who makes a tennis ball speak - and a monkey curse. But you don't anticipate to well up."
Clive Barnes of the
New York Post says, "[A]ll in all, this is a surprising, and extremely funny, one-man show that has a character to it and more than a few characters in it." One wonders why he only gave the show 2 and a half stars.
After noting how creepy he's always found ventriloquists and their dummies,
Variety's
David Rooney admits, "The writing is old-fashioned and the humor a little hoary, but there's a sweet, self-effacing quality to Johnson's unforced stage manner, magnified by his willingness to play second fiddle whenever he has a puppet in hand."
While
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only has an open-ended run, will the critics praise be enough to attract new audiences to this old-fashioned art form? If only Johnson himself could provide a little more word of mouth beyond his dummies.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.Related Stories:A Twofer Opening (September 28, 2006)
Labels: Broadway, Critics' Capsule, Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, Play
A Twofer OpeningIt’s been nearly 30 years since ventriloquist
Jay Johnson first appeared on the television comedy "
Soap." After that program went off the air, I’m willing to bet that it’s the last time the overwhelming majority of audiences saw him.
Perhaps after having seen how the Great White Way is now safe for puppets, thanks in no small measure to the rousing success of
Avenue Q, Johnson is back in the public eye with his dummies -- more than twenty years post-"Soap" -- in a Broadway show of all things. He’s celebrating his fading art form with
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, opening this evening at the
Helen Hayes Theatre.
The road Johnson has traveled has no doubt been long and winding, and indeed many of his more recent stops have received critical praise. So how will his entry be met by the critics? We’ll find out tomorrow.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.Labels: Broadway, Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, Opening Night, Play
Rent: 5,492,160 Minutes And CountingIt's been nearly ten and a half years since
Rent --
Jonathan Larson's East Village take on
La Bohème -- opened on Broadway. But is its time running out?
If you look at this past week's box office totals,
Rent is in a class by itself among all musicals, and given the category I'm talking about, that
isn't good. It is the only Broadway tuner to have an average ticket price of under $50. At $49.43, that makes the egalitarian show eminently accessible for most audiences. But with overall box office now selling only 58.6% capacity -- down 6.8% from last week -- can this groundbreaking show remain open?
The only musical playing to less capacity is
The Producers, which saw a week-over-week drop of 4.1% to 50.4%. However, the average ticket price for
Mel Brooks' most successful venture ever on the Great White Way still comes in at $68.65.
Rent and
The Producers are the only two musicals playing to capacities of under 60%.
Of course, both of those productions are doing boffo box office compared with the week's weakest link,
Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, which in its first full week of previews attracted a capacity of only 24.4% with an average ticket price of just $47.80. That certainly doesn't bode well for its opening later this week unless it gets positive notices from the critics.
And for the week's box office champs? In terms of capacity,
Usher's apparently working his magic by ushering
Chicago back to the top (up 3.8% to 101.2% capacity).
Jersey Boys drops to number two (down .1% to 100.7%) with
Wicked right behind (down .5% to 99.7%). In terms of average ticket prices,
Jersey Boys is still tops with $118.67, followed by
Wicked at $95.24 and then
Chicago at $89.36. However, in terms of overall weekly gross,
Wicked remains king with a total take of $1,367,250;
Jersey Boys took in $1,167,994;
The Color Purple was third with $938,537 (
Chicago only ranked eighth with $781,545 in receipts).
Will dwindling numbers for Rent and The Producers spur closing notices anytime soon? Stay tuned.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Related Stories:
Broadway Box Office Rebounds (September 19, 2006)
Broadway's Biggest Box Office (September 13, 2006)
Fall At Broadway's Box Office (September 12, 2006)
Labels: Box Office, Broadway, Chicago The Musical, Jay Johnson: The Two And Only, Jersey Boys, Musical, Rent, The Producers, Wicked
