At the top end it's more than you might think. Phantom costs almost a million USD a week to put on Broadway, supposedly. The Vienna Opera house gets about 55 million Euro a year purely in government subsidy, before ticket sales. And it is uh, not turning a profit.
Almost every house in Europe runs a loss, it's been that way since the 1650s, subsidised by either the state or rich assholes, pays starvation wages even to the leads, somehow never makes the money back, rich assholes get tax write off...oh...look...all the production budget went to their set painting side business.
Sydney runs in the black, at the cost of exactly 1 interesting opera a year, the rest horrible stagings of Traviata, and firing the chorus for 3 months to put on a musical (which they have to re-audition for)
At the top end it's more than you might think. Phantom costs almost a million USD a week to put on Broadway, supposedly. The Vienna Opera house gets about 55 million Euro a year purely in government subsidy, before ticket sales. And it is uh, not turning a profit.
:thonk: 2001's budget adjusted for inflation would be running that phantom show for 84 weeks. which i guess isn't all that long really
15 euro for nosebleeds in an opera house & the government's running it at a loss? :ussr-cry: consequences of the fall
Almost every house in Europe runs a loss, it's been that way since the 1650s, subsidised by either the state or rich assholes, pays starvation wages even to the leads, somehow never makes the money back, rich assholes get tax write off...oh...look...all the production budget went to their set painting side business.
Sydney runs in the black, at the cost of exactly 1 interesting opera a year, the rest horrible stagings of Traviata, and firing the chorus for 3 months to put on a musical (which they have to re-audition for)
justifying my ignorance of opera because of the bourgeois practices and tradition of the houses:denguin: