“Dear Evan Hansen” and “Tina,” two Broadway musicals that had been selling strongly before the coronavirus pandemic but never recovered following the lengthy theater closure, both announced Tuesday that they would close late this summer.
“Dear Evan Hansen,” a heart-tugging musical about an awkward adolescent who tells a terrible lie, will end its run on Broadway on Sept. 18, five years after winning the Tony Award for best new musical.
The show opened to enormous acclaim and has been a significant hit, but it suffered a double blow from the coronavirus pandemic and a poorly received film adaptation, and has in recent months been soft at the box office.
“Tina,” a jukebox musical about the life and career of seminal rocker Tina Turner, will end its run on Aug. 14.
Both shows will continue to play outside New York. “Dear Evan Hansen” is closing its London production in October, but a North American tour has been selling well and is continuing. “Tina” will begin a North American tour in September, and is also running in Britain, Germany, Spain and the Netherlands.
“Dear Evan Hansen” began its Broadway run on Nov. 14, 2016, and opened Dec. 4, 2016. At the time that it closes, it will have played 21 preview performances and 1,678 regular performances.
The musical, produced by Stacey Mindich and directed by Michael Greif, began its life at Arena Stage in Washington, and then had an Off Broadway run at Second Stage before transferring to Broadway. It won six Tony Awards, including for the score by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, the book by Steven Levenson, and two of its performers: Ben Platt, who played the title character, and Rachel Bay Jones, who played his mother.
Not only did the show win the best musical Tony, but the London production won the Olivier Award for best new musical, and the cast album won a Grammy.
The show, which long ago recouped its capitalization costs and became profitable, was regularly grossing over $1 million a week before Broadway shut down in 2020 because of the coronavirus pandemic. In 2021, a film adaptation was released and was the subject of significant online derision; it’s not clear how that affected the stage version, but grosses have been unsteady and slipping since the show resumed performances last December. The show grossed $588,371 during the week that ended May 29.
“Tina,” with music from the singer’s catalog and a book by Katori Hall, began its life in London and then transferred to Broadway, starting previews on Oct. 12, 2019, and opening on Nov. 7, 2019. The musical, produced by Stage Entertainment, which is a large European production company, is directed by Phyllida Lloyd; it won one Tony Award, for its lead actress, Adrienne Warren.
“Tina,” which has a much larger cast and a more elaborate physical production than “Dear Evan Hansen,” which means it costs more to run each week, was generally grossing over $1.5 million a week before the pandemic; it was again selling strongly after resuming performances last fall, but its box office grosses plummeted with the arrival of the Omicron variant and never fully rebounded. The show grossed $909,006 during the week ending May 29. At the time of its closing, “Tina” will have played 27 preview performances and 482 regular performances.
