Toronto, Theatre's Third City

▪ 1995

      By the 1990s Toronto had quietly become the third-largest theatre centre in the English-speaking world, after New York City and London. With a population approaching four million in the metropolitan area, Toronto had come to serve as host to a wide range of theatrical activity, from fringe festivals in the summer to several midsize, not-for-profit theatres, national and international festivals, and, in 1994, four long-running, full-scale Broadway musicals. By 1994 there were more than 70 full-time theatrical venues in the city and an average of 75 productions every month. More than seven million tickets were sold during the year, half of them to tourists. The gross revenue for Toronto's commercial theatres was more than $200 million, accounting for 10% of all sales in North America, second only to New York, and the total economic impact on the Toronto economy was estimated at $1.2 billion.

      Broadway musicals in Toronto in 1994 included The Phantom of the Opera, which had run for more than five years in the renovated Pantages Theatre. Phantom's Toronto producer, Garth Drabinsky, was also responsible for the productions of the Hal Prince-directed Kiss of the Spider Woman and Show Boat, both of which had their premieres in Toronto before transferring to Broadway. The Toronto production of Show Boat, meanwhile, was scheduled to continue into 1995, after which it would make way for Sunset Boulevard. Ed and David Mirvish's productions of Crazy for You and Miss Saigon—the latter in the stunning, specially built Princess of Wales Theatre—continued to run profitably, and David Mirvish was set to present his own production of The Who's Tommy early in 1995. A Toronto production of the nostalgic musical Forever Plaid was into its third year, and the city consistently turned out for touring musicals in several large commercial venues. Other independent commercial productions running with various success included Stephen Sondheim's Assassins and Canadian John Roby's musical The Old Man's Band.

      It was not all roses for commercial theatre in Toronto, however. The large-scale, independently produced Canadian musical Napoleon was neither a critical nor a box-office success, although it was seen by 60,000 people in nearly three months before it closed in May. Later, a production of George F. Walker's comedy-drama Nothing Sacred opened at the spacious Winter Garden Theatre, only to close after two and a half months of half-empty houses. Nonetheless, the fact that commercial productions could even get off the ground in Toronto spoke volumes, especially for such high-risk ventures as a new musical (the Napoleon budget was $5 million). (H.J. KIRCHHOFF)

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