The latest Broadway rendition of Shakespeare’s Othello starring Denzel Washington can cost as much as $1,000 a ticket, with one critic reporting that audience members were laughing at the most climactic scene in the play.
The shocking observation came from investigative journalist Vicky Ward, who has had a long career in legacy media. Most recently, she was a senior reporter at CNN.
Ward published her recollection of the extremely pricey, star-studded show on her Substack newsletter: ‘Vicky Ward Investigates.’
She wrote that the moment when Othello, played by Washington, strangles his wife Desdemona based on lies fabricated by Iago, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, ‘there were a few laughs in the audience.’
Ward later told The Times that she thought the moment came so suddenly, some audience members simply weren’t ready for it – causing the lack of decorum.
‘To pay an obscene amount of money and then for there to be laughter, at the climax?’ she said – noting the lack of theater etiquette from some audience members.
Seeing the play this Friday at the historic Ethel Barrymore Theatre will set you back at least $544 for seats in the back of the orchestra section.
An elevated view from the mezzanine is priced at $844, while snagging a seat in the seventh row costs a staggering $995.
The latest Broadway rendition of Shakespeare’s Othello stars Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal. The show can set you back as much as $1,000 a ticket
Pictured: Washington, as Othello, and Gyllenhaal, as Iago, give a bow to the audience after a show
There are only 40 seats left for that 8pm showing, likely a function of Broadway junkies rushing to get a chance to see the star-powered production before it concludes its abbreviated 15-week run in the beginning of June.
However, there is no indication that fans are putting away their wallets. Othello made $2.8 million for its eight performances last week.
That makes it the highest-grossing Broadway play in history over the course of a single week.
The absurd prices for Broadway shows aren’t at all limited to Othello, with the average admission cost reaching $119 as of the week ending January 26, 2025.
The new production of Glengarry Glen Ross – starring Kieran Culkin, Bob Odenkirk, and Bill Burr – is charging $844 for orchestra seats.
Veteran Broadway critic Roger Friedman, the editor of Showbiz411, told The Times that ‘it should be $250 for an orchestra seat and that should be the top.’
Friedman said if these were the prices scalpers or resale sites were charging, he could understand it. But direct sales of the tickets being in the high three figures baffled him.
Even the mega-popular Wicked, which had the advantage of seating twice as many people as Othello’s home theater and having a film adaptation increase awareness, came in second to Othello last week, at a respectable $2.4 million.
Investigative journalist Vicky Ward pointed out in a recent edition of her Substack newsletter that people laughed during the most climactic moment of Othello
Tickets for Glengarry Glen Ross – starring Kieran Culkin, Bob Odenkirk, and Bill Burr – are also quite elevated. Like Othello, it has an abbreviated run on Broadway, only going until June 14
Marc Hershberg, a Broadway producer, said rising ticket prices reflect increased costs on the production side.
He told The Times that getting a musical to Broadway now costs $19.8 million, up $1 million from last year.
‘It’s really scary right now, because the shows are getting so expensive to run, and as a result, ticket prices need to be higher,’ he said.
Not only that, producers feel they are ‘competing against blockbuster films and really expensive television programs,’ he added.
‘I think they feel compelled to throw a lot of money on stage and so as a result, it’s sort of become a race to the top or race to the bottom, depending on how you look at it,’ he said.
Broadway appears to have no incentive to discount tickets any time in the near future, considering that sales have made a remarkable rebound since the pandemic.
In the 2018-2019 season, the last full season before the COVID-19 triggered the lockdowns, the Broadway League reports a total gross of $1.8 billion.
Over the course of the 2023-2024 season, sales reached $1.5 billion. This is an 82 percent increase from two years earlier when there were 10 fewer weeks in the season.
