Why wasn't there any room for Room on Broadway?

13:53Why was there no room for Room on Broadway?

A week ago today, actors and crew members for the Broadway production of Room — an adaptation of the novel by Irish-Canadian author Emma Donoghue — showed up for work, only to find out that the production had been "indefinitely postponed."

Coming out of a critically acclaimed run in Toronto and London, Ont., the production was only a few weeks away from opening night. 

Even now, there are still a lot of unanswered questions about what really happened to the production. Toronto theatre critic Glenn Sumi joined host Elamin Abdelmahmoud to break down the timeline of events.

We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow the Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud podcast, on your favourite podcast player.

Elamin: Glenn, I really appreciate you being here because this is a really big story. This is not something that happens all the time. Did the actors have any idea the production might be in any kind of trouble?

Glenn: It honestly doesn't sound like it, which makes it all the more surprising. I mean, they were 18 days from going up on stage. I think the first preview was supposed to be April 3. The show had already had some success in Dublin and London and Toronto, and even London, Ont. Warren had just come off winning a Tony Award a couple of years earlier for playing Tina Turner. So things like this are not supposed to happen. It was not the cast or the production, so they weren't sort of mucking it up for the producers to pull out. So this is a very weird situation.

Elamin: Let's talk about what we know. What reason were they given? 

Glenn: They were told that a major producer had pulled out. It was revealed later, I think by The New York Times, that that producer had pulled out for "personal reasons." There were some last ditch efforts to make up the shortfall, to try to fill that gap — I think it had been capitalized at $7 million — but obviously, they didn't come through. So to make an announcement like that is a pretty big deal, if they made all the phone calls to see if people could come up with the money and it just didn't happen.

Elamin: Let's talk about the source material of the show for anyone who's not familiar with the show. What do you think it is that makes it so remarkable?

Glenn: It's just a very powerful, harrowing story. It's about a woman who was abducted as a teenager, and basically imprisoned in a locked shed where she was, and is, being raped by her abductor. She gives birth to a son — obviously, we know who the father is — and for the past five years, she has raised him in this single room. One of the interesting things about the novel and the adaptation is the boy knows nothing of the outside world, so this room is his world. I won't spoil the rest for people who haven't read the book or seen the film or the stage versions, but among other things, Room is just a brilliant vehicle for an actor. You probably saw the film version, and Brie Larson played the mother—

Elamin: Won an Oscar for it!

Glenn: She won an Oscar! An earlier version of Room played here in Toronto, and Alexis Gordon — who is the lead actress and turns out to be the standby and the understudy for the Broadway version — won a Dora Award, which is Toronto's equivalent of the Tonys. So I think if this production had gone on, Adrienne Warren probably would have been looking at a Tony nomination, and possibly a second win. It's that kind of role that if you do it well, will win you awards.

Elamin: The source material is deeply respected — the novel ended up winning a lot of awards, the film was nominated for a lot of Academy Awards including best picture. It's very clearly a high-stakes show, right? What did you make of the staging here in Canada when you saw it? 

Glenn: Yeah, it's strange because it debuted here in Toronto almost exactly a year ago. We were just coming out of two years of pretty heavy lockdown, and I think because so much of [the play] took place in this confined single room, the isolation of the characters really hit home. To me, it almost felt like a metaphor of what we had all just gone through dealing with isolation, with these lost years, and processing all of this trauma and grief — obviously, not as much as the central character in Room, but still, we were all kind of just trying to process that. It got very good reviews and, as I said, Alexis Gordon won the highest award that you can win in Toronto theatre.

Elamin: So let me ask you about Alexis Gordon. If you are the understudy on Broadway for a show like this, what's on the line for you as an actor?

Glenn: Oh, I mean, it's a big deal. Theatre lovers had seen Alexis Gordon for years at the Stratford Festival, the Shaw Festival, and here she was about to step onto a Broadway stage for the first time in her life. She was an understudy, but I think because that role is so difficult and so harrowing, I'm pretty sure she would have gone on eventually, taking over for Adrianne Warren at least one or two performances a week. For a theatre actor, it is the major league, so I think it says something that the producers had seen her in Toronto and London, Ont., and were so impressed with her that they hired her to be the understudy. I just hope that she's making good use of the time while she's in New York — she's networking, making connections. I hope people hear her sing, and perhaps she can find some other work.

Elamin: Realistically, what are the chances that a production like this ends up succeeding on Broadway?

Glenn: I think with rising inflation, the bank crisis and just that sort of general economic uncertainty that we're all feeling, combined with the heaviness of the material … let's be straight: this isn't a feel-good show. It's cathartic, let's say. You've got to factor in that many audience members still aren't quite comfortable going to a big Broadway show, especially if most people aren't going to be masked in that show. So I think it would have been a tough sell even if it had gone through on Broadway. Now off-Broadway, I can see it doing really well, and most of the theatre that we see in Canada is not for profit. It's sort of similar to off-Broadway. Broadway is its own situation. It is a commercial enterprise. They have to make money.… I think people want that feel-good, fun show where they can escape. There's the Michael Jackson musical, which is doing well. So I think people want that sort of sense of comfort and familiarity, especially coming out of the pandemic.  

Elamin: So all of this went down the week that Signature Bank collapsed. That's a bank that held 40 to 50 per cent of all Broadway assets. What's the takeaway in terms of financing Broadway shows going forward from this moment?

Glenn: I mean, you know, even before the pandemic, there was a figure out there that said I think one in five Broadway shows will recoup their investment and go on to make a profit. But there's also a saying that it's tough to make a living on Broadway, but if you do, you will make a killing. So those long-running shows, some of them have run for four decades. They have made their investors millionaires many times over. So I think people are chasing that sort of brass ring. They want to be the next Wicked or Hamilton. But I think in these times you've got to be cautious. Maybe if they had tried it out off-Broadway first to generate some sort of interest and audience support, maybe then investors would have been more on board. It's tough times out there.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.