Disney’s blockbuster musical The Lion King is about to become the first Broadway show ever to gross one billion dollars.
The musical has been a tremendous success for Disney Theatrical Productions, playing to nearly sold-out crowds for sixteen years, and winning six Tony Awards (including Best Musical).
How has Lion King achieved this historic feat? It charges a ticket price higher than almost any other show – its average ticket price is over $130, second only to Book of Mormon and Kinky Boots. Combine that with one of Broadway’s biggest theaters – a seating capacity of 1700, the fifth-biggest on Broadway – and you get a lot of people paying a lot of money. There have been over 11.2 million tickets sold to the show. So that’s how $1 billion was achieved.
The next closest show is the classic Phantom of the Opera, which has amassed about $930 million, despite having a decade’s head start on Lion King. The Lion King is currently the fifth longest running show on Broadway, behind Phantom, Cats, Chicago, and Les Mis. It will surpass Les Mis’ run by the end of the year to claim fourth place.
Of course, The Lion King has been breaking records for Disney in all its iterations. The movie is the highest grossing traditionally animated film of all time, both in the US ($422.8 million) and worldwide ($961.5 million). Its domestic gross is the eleventh-highest ever, and worldwide it’s ranked twentieth. Showing what a lucrative business Broadway is, the show’s domestic gross is higher than the film’s worldwide gross. And this doesn’t even take into account the show’s national tour (which hit $1 billion this summer), nor the nearly twenty international productions.
The Lion King’s success surely contributed to Disney Theatrical’s rapid expansion in the last decade. Lion King was their second Broadway show, following a very successful Beauty and the Beast. Disney is currently represented on Broadway with Lion King, their 2012 hit Newsies, and the off-Broadway Peter and the Starcatchers. They doubtlessly hope that Aladdin, hitting Broadway in March, will be able to even partially replicate Lion King’s success.
Did you ever see The Lion King on Broadway? Did you like it?
Thanks, Playbill
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