The New York Times has a new darling: Jeremy O. Harris, whose “Slave Play” began previews Tuesday at the Golden Theatre after last year’s sold-out run at New York Theatre Workshop.
The paper gushed over the off-Broadway production (“willfully provocative … altogether staggering”) and its 30-year-old playwright (his magnetism is “undeniable, almost carnal”), as well as his fashion sense (“Gucci sneakers and a tasteful Gant sweater”). In yet another feature, readers were told to see it or risk missing out on the “cultural conversation.”
Well, many may have concluded they’ll live if they do.
Sources say the $3.5 million “Slave Play” has sold only $800,000 worth of heavily discounted tickets and is on track to lose a substantial amount of money during previews. Its producers have reportedly been scouring Shubert Alley for money, though a spokesman says the show is fully capitalized. Rival producers say that unless there’s a boom at the box office, “Slave Play” could close before the end of its 17-week run.
Once upon a time, the Times could make or break a play. Frank Rich certainly made Tony Kushner and “Angels in America” part of the “cultural conversation” in 1993. Critics simply don’t have that kind of power anymore, nor does the paper’s once influential Arts & Leisure section.
“If you had a story in [the Times’] Arts & Leisure, you were guaranteed to sell a few hundred thousand in tickets,” says a press agent. “It doesn’t move the needle anymore.”
“Slave Play” moved to Broadway “with the knowledge it would have the full backing of the Times,” says a producer unrelated to the show, “but that’s not a good enough reason anymore.”
The play’s producers may be counting on Harris’ social-media following — he has more than 35,000 Instagram followers — and that of his cast to sell tickets. That, too, may be a miscalculation.
“Social media is completely overrated as a driver of ticket sales,” says a veteran producer. “The kids think if they have thousands of followers on Twitter, everybody will come see their show. Doesn’t happen.”
Unless there’s a boom at the box office, ‘Slave Play’ could close before the end of its 17-week run.
Case in point: “Be More Chill” creator Joe Iconis has more than 52,000 Instagram followers. His show lasted barely six months on Broadway.
“Slave Play” takes place on a plantation in antebellum Virginia, where slaves and masters get up to all manner of sexual high jinks, much of it graphic. Midway through its intermission-free two hours, the play switches gears and the characters become interracial couples in a modern-day sex therapy session.
Theater critics tend to like all this stuff about sexuality, identity politics, racism, oppression and white supremacy. To them, it’s “provocative,” an “urgent conversation.” (Spare me the word “conversation,” please.)
But theatergoers who pay for their tickets are more skeptical. You can understand why some, learning about “Slave Play” for the first time, might opt to see Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker in “Plaza Suite” instead.
Production spokesman Rick Miramontez tells me, “I assure you this town is teeming with adventurous theater lovers who will find their way to the Golden Theatre while you’re hanging outside the St. James waiting to find out who’s going to replace Carol Channing in ‘Hello, Dolly!’ ”
Snap.
Peter Nichols, who died this week at 92, was one of Britain’s leading playwrights until he fell out of favor in the ’80s and ’90s. Works such as “A Day in the Death of Joe Egg,” “Privates on Parade,” “The National Health” and “Passion Play” are right up there with anything by Harold Pinter, Tom Stoppard and David Hare. But after a few high-profile flops, Nichols turned to writing novels, none of which were published.
“Joe Egg” is about a couple’s struggle to raise a child with cerebral palsy. (Nichols and his wife had a severely disabled daughter.) The original draft, Nichols once told me, was “a rather grim, dreary sort of play that was dull in its tone.” But then he refined it into a black comedy that made his reputation. “I always tell people not to play it like Strindberg, but like Noël Coward,” he said.
His lesser-known plays are well worth a look. “A Piece of My Mind” is a biting look at rivalry in the theater (Nichols always resented Stoppard’s success.) And “Forget-Me-Not-Lane” is a funny and moving play about a middle-aged man looking back on his younger self.
One of its fans is Stephen Sondheim.
“When Hal Prince and I saw ‘Forget-Me-Not-Lane,’ not only did we like it a lot, but we felt Peter was a kindred spirit,” Sondheim tells me. “So we invited him to lunch and it forged a friendship that lasted almost 50 years. He was a smart, charming and acerbic fellow and I miss him already.”
“Len Berman and Michael Riedel in the Morning” airs weekdays on WOR radio 710.
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