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After only 21 preview performances and 38 regular performances, the Broadway revival of William Gibson’s play “The Miracle Worker” will close next April 4 at Circle in the Square Theater, the producers David Richenthal and Dini von Mueffling said on March 28.
The show cost $2.6 million to mount and will close at a total loss to its producers and investors, a spokesman for the show said.
The story of a young Helen Keller (Abigail Breslin, pictured) learning to communicate under the guidance of her teacher, Annie Sullivan (Alison Pill, right), “The Miracle Worker” opened on March 3 to mixed reviews and never managed to attract much of an audience.
The show’s grosses during full weeks of eight performances were uneven, ranging from $165,000 to $256,000. Mr. Richenthal had secured financing this month to keep the show running through mid-April in hopes of capturing a share of the school vacation market. He then left New York to tend to health issues, leaving his decision-making authority about the show to Ms. von Mueffling, his wife.
In response to questions about why the show would not run until at least until mid-April, Ms. von Mueffling said in a statement: “In spite of additional advertising, ticket sales did not pick up as much as we thought they would. Closing is the only fiscally prudent choice, as difficult and sad a decision as it is.”
Beth Haller, Ph.D., is Co-Director of the Global Alliance for Disability in Media and Entertainment (www.gadim.org). A former print journalist, she is a member of the Advisory Board for the National Center on Disability and Journalism (https://ncdj.org/). Haller is Professor Emerita in the Department of Mass Communication at Towson University in Maryland, USA. Haller is co-editor of the 2020 "Routledge Companion to Disability and Media" (with Gerard Goggin of University of Sydney & Katie Ellis of Curtin University, Australia). She is author of "Representing Disability in an Ableist World: Essays on Mass Media" (Advocado Press, 2010) and the author/editor of Byline of Hope: Collected Newspaper and Magazine Writing of Helen Keller (Advocado Press, 2015). She has been researching disability representation in mass media for 30+ years. She is adjunct faculty in the Disability Studies programs at the City University of New York (CUNY) and the University of Texas-Arlington.
From The New York Times:
