Official - Avenue Q lost money in Australia.

A while back, there was quite a debate on this site regarding Avenue Q - would the musical work commercially down under. The results are in. According to the show's local producer, it didn't. Full article below. It was on page 4 for people with a hard copy of The Australian. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/behind-this-american-puppet-is-michael-butel/story-e6frg6nf-1225914508191 Behind this American puppet . . . is Michael Butel * Michaela Boland * From: The Australian * September 06, 2010 12:00AM FOR the past year, Mitchell Butel has toured the nation as the lead puppet in the quirky US musical Avenue Q His performance earned the musical, produced by Adelaide company Arts Asia Pacific, one of eight nominations for the national performing arts industry's Helpmann Awards, which will be announced at the Sydney Opera House tonight. But for all the accolades and strong word-of-mouth, the show with a Sesame Street bent found itself competing for audiences with a slew of musicals when the musical theatre industry re-energised in the latter half of last year. The surge of activity not only in musicals but also in the concert industry and other performing arts resulted in a total $1.1 billion at the box office last year. Across 10 distinct live performance sectors, 15.2 million tickets were sold to December, according to new figures released by industry body Live Performance Australia. Overall, ticket sales were down 4 per cent on the previous year but LPA president Andrew Kay said last year was better than expected. "The reason live entertainment doesn't necessarily suffer is because we can respond to the economy by changing the product," he said. Australia's showbiz industry peaked with the broader economy in 2007 when 20.1 million tickets generated $1.2bn at the box office. Ticket sales then fell by 25 per cent in 2008. Mr Kay said the growth in ticket prices reveals the strength of the live entertainment economy. Avenue Q producer Torben Brookman said a breakdown of the figures would reveal a much-stronger second half compared with early last year when some shows were cancelled and others sold weakly because of the grim broader economy. High School Musical, for example, was cancelled early last year, which led to empty theatres in some cities. "Before the really big shows like Wicked and Jersey Boys kicked in, there was a lull," Mr Brookman said. Avenue Q opened last year, and audiences brave enough to buy a ticket to a musical by puppets loved it. It toured for more than a year before it closed in June, yet it failed to return a profit, a fact hidden by LPA's figures. "The most dramatic impact was sponsorship dollars dried up so it was harder to offset additional marketing costs, which all flows on to lower gross sales," Mr Brookman said.