“Amazing Grace,” the musical about the conversion of John Newton from slave trader to abolitionist, will close on October 25, most likely at a loss of its entire $6.4 million investment. The show opened in July to mediocre reviews and struggled at the box-office, rarely grossing above $300,000 per week and playing to half-houses.However, this first casualty of the 2015-2016 limps off the stage having run long enough — 116 regular performances — to be branded and to have earned a national tour, where its commercial prospects may be more sanguine. An indication of how well it might do on the road actually came during its pre-Broadway tryout in Chicago earlier this year. While sales for that engagement began tepidly, they slowly grew to top out at $650,000 per week. Carolyn Rossi Copeland, the show’s lead producer, says that one of the reasons for the successful engagement in Chicago was because “we had more time to reach out to the faith-based market. We had seven months then but much less time in New York.”Marketing to the Christian community has proved highly successful in the movie industry, but Broadway has had little if no experience in that regard. Plays of sincere religious conviction are few and far between. Most musicals that wade into the secular atmosphere of New York Theater treat faith cavalierly or with a certain mockery, such as “Hand to God” and “Book of Mormon.”But “Amazing Grace,” with its 19th-century British hero who composed the iconic hymn, from which it takes its title, is a natural fit for those who are looking for entertainment with an uplifting spiritual message. The producers were aware that there was an opportunity to tap into a market that has filled the coffers of such producers as Mark Burnett and Roma Downey (“The Bible” miniseries).“We are pioneers in trying to reach people of faith but there’s obviously a difference,” said Copeland, pointing out that film and TV are much cheaper and more available to that target audience. “We have to get them to come to New York. I think we’ll be much more successful on the road where there are these markets which are eager for this kind of product.”Asked if she’d encountered any resistance from Christian groups because of their skepticism or suspicion of “secular” Broadway, she recalled that during a group sales event in Chicago she was approached by two women from religiously-affiliated schools. “They were very angry before the event,” she says. “‘Is this going to be another one of those shows that are trying to pull one over on us?’ And I simply told them to watch the presentation. The work has to speak for itself. Afterwards they came up and said that they were booking their entire schools.” The problem is that while “Amazing Grace” was able to attract the religiously inclined, it could not appeal to the traditional theatergoers in sufficient numbers. Conservative commentator Glenn Beck was a huge fan and touted the show incessantly. But they also needed Oprah. The national tour, produced by Troika Entertainment, will offer the musical a second chance — much as the once-dissolute John Newton was presented with a chance at redemption, a moral journey which he recounted in one of the most beloved anthems of all time.“We’re at an interesting place with this musical,” says Copeland. “We started working on this in 2008 hardly knowing that we would open when racial issues are so much a part of the national conversation.”Referring to President Barack Obama spontaneously breaking into “Amazing Grace” at the funeral of the Reverend Clementa Pinckney in Charleston, Copeland said, “We had our first bi-racial president offering it as a healing balm at a time that required immense healing. We are so desperately in need of the conversation that people are having after they see our show.”
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