I found it fascinating that the London theatre business is such that a play must continue running for a minimum period (described in the article) even if it's a failure. That's really bizarre.
In my younger childless life, I used to go to the theatre fairly often and even had a Goodman subscription. I don't think I ever saw anything that would have qualified as a flop or even an artistic failure, but the Chicago theatre scene is pretty vibrant. While we lived in Los Angeles, we went to the theatre less often, but again a pretty vibrant theatre scene although not as risk-taking as Chicago (many smaller venues seemed to be actor-financed productions meant to catch casting directors' eyes, but none of these actor-producers had Ed Wood–like blindness to bad production, at least none that I saw).
My sense is that New York is a lot more risk-averse, especially in the main stages. Perhaps things get more daring in smaller venues in the outer boroughs?
In major cities, there are a lot of smaller theatre companies you can go to. The quality is a bit hit or miss but tickets prices tend to be in in tens rather than hundreds of dollars. (NYC will be more expensive of course.) I have a subscription to a theatre that has a couple of companies in Cambridge MA and it's always an enjoyable night out and is pretty economical.
It's probably not that it must continue but rather that it must pay the rent and salaries anyway, so if the venue is going to be 1/3 full then it's at least some revenue to compensate instead of nothing and they continue.
In my younger childless life, I used to go to the theatre fairly often and even had a Goodman subscription. I don't think I ever saw anything that would have qualified as a flop or even an artistic failure, but the Chicago theatre scene is pretty vibrant. While we lived in Los Angeles, we went to the theatre less often, but again a pretty vibrant theatre scene although not as risk-taking as Chicago (many smaller venues seemed to be actor-financed productions meant to catch casting directors' eyes, but none of these actor-producers had Ed Wood–like blindness to bad production, at least none that I saw).
My sense is that New York is a lot more risk-averse, especially in the main stages. Perhaps things get more daring in smaller venues in the outer boroughs?