| re: Could a revival of "Drat! the Cat!" work? | |
| Posted by: AlanScott 02:32 am EDT 07/17/24 | |
| In reply to: re: Could a revival of "Drat! the Cat!" work? - keikekaze 04:54 pm EDT 07/16/24 | |
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| Eddie Foy, Jr., played two supporting roles. One of them appeared in one scene. He played the first two weeks out of town. He was replaced by two actors already in the cast. My guess is that they were his understudies. So I wouldn't think that added much to the expenses. Suskin in More Opening Nights on Broadway tallied the reviews as three favorable (but no raves, as Suskin differentiates between the two), one mixed, and two unfavorable. Variety tallied the press reviews as four qualified approvals and four pans and tallied the broadcast reviews as five pans. Variety included Chapman's Daily News review among the qualified approvals, but I would say it was mixed, and I'm guessing that's the mixed review in Suskin's tally. While Kerr's qualified approval in the Herald Tribune might have sent some folks to the box office, I think Chapman's review would not have made many people buy tickets. Not that I think Chapman had much clout with ticket buyers by 1965. But along with Kerr, Taubman in the Times and Watts in the Post (a very different paper back then) did, and they were both negative. So of the three most important reviews, two were negative. What certainly didn't help was a 24-day newspaper strike that was settled on the day of the opening. The press reviews appeared in the major dailies on their first day back. So there was little effective advertising for three-and-a-half weeks before the opening. Having said that, I don't really think it would have made much difference if there hadn't been a strike. It had no names in the cast. And while Ira Levin was later a name writer, he was much less so in 1965, and even after he became a big-name writer, his name by itself never seemed to have meant much on its own at the box office. Rosemary's Baby was a huge best-seller when Dr. Cook's Garden opened, and it ran a week. Later, Break a Leg ran one performance. As you say, Drat! The Cat! had no advance sale. It would have needed much better reviews to overcome all that was going against it. |
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| Previous: | re: Could a revival of "Drat! the Cat!" work? - keikekaze 04:54 pm EDT 07/16/24 |
| Next: | re: Could a revival of "Drat! the Cat!" work? - BroadwayTonyJ 05:24 pm EDT 07/16/24 |
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