Lea Michele's Funny Girl Takeover Causes Ticket Price Spike

Lea Michele’s Funny Girl Takeover Causes Ticket Price Spike

Home » Lea Michele’s Funny Girl Takeover Causes Ticket Price Spike

BroadwayDave Clark3 years ago

Lea Michele was announced as the new Fanny Brice for Broadway’s Funny Girl revival beginning September 6, and ticket prices are spiking for the production at August Wilson Theatre. The Glee star is taking over for Beanie Feldstein, who will play her last performance at the end of July. Current standby Julie Benko will take over the role for August and the beginning of September before Michele joins the cast.

Michele has long desired to take the Fanny Bryce role on Broadway, according to Broadway.com:

Although she’s never played the role of Fanny Brice, Michele has a long history with the part and the show’s legendary score. She first sang “Don’t Rain on My Parade” in the first season of Glee, when her character Rachel Berry performed it in a competition. The song became a go-to for Berry and for Michele, who also performed it at the 2010 Tony Awards. Of course, in season four of Glee, Berry actually lands the lead role in a fictional revival of Funny Girl. And then, in 2014, Michele revealed that Glee creator Ryan Murphy had obtained the rights to the show, but his planned Broadway revival never came to fruition.

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It would appear that audiences are as excited to see her take over, as ticket prices for her early shows are already spiking, according to Ticket Club. Tickets for the September 6 Funny Girl on Broadway show that launches Michele’s run (which does not have an announced end-date yet) are listed at a “get-in” of no less than $600 as of Thursday afternoon, according to the ticket resale marketplace with no service fees for members. For comparison, the final Saturday show of Feldstein’s run in the role, July 30, has a “get-in” of $100 per ticket.

In another casting change on the revival, multiple Tony Award nominee Tovah Feldshuh will be joining the cast at the same time as Michele, taking over for Jane Lynch in the role of Mrs. Bryce.

Benko has been the standby for the Brice role since the revival opened earlier this year, taking the stage regularly in place of Feldstein, who has had multiple bouts of COVID-19 force her to miss performances. Tickets for the show are currently on sale through March 26 of 2023.