Open Forum

My theatre department is gearing up to fund raise for our participation in the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.  One method for fundraising will involve producing several shows next school year.  One of those shows we were hoping to produce was Grease School Edition.  My students apparently have the grave misfortune of performing in an auditorium with 1400 seats, our average attendance is 300 per performance.  Samuel French just quoted me the price of $12430.00 to produce 6 performances of Grease School Edition.  That price is more than 50% of my budget.  Because of this I am confident my students will never have the opportunity to perform this particular show.  In comparison, we can perform other well known musicals for the average rate of $4500 for that number of performances.  This is insane and an insult to educational theatre.  Other than obviously not giving them my business, do I have any recourse?  I have been told by Samuel French that they are simply the middle man and that the Estate and Authors are the ones that set these high prices.

Thanks!

My theatre department is gearing up to fund raise for our participation in the 2017 Edinburgh Fringe Festival.  One method for fundraising will involve producing several shows next school year.  One of those shows we were hoping to produce was Grease School Edition.  My students apparently have the grave misfortune of performing in an auditorium with 1400 seats, our average attendance is 300 per performance.  Samuel French just quoted me the price of $12430.00 to produce 6 performances of Grease School Edition.  That price is more than 50% of my budget.  Because of this I am confident my students will never have the opportunity to perform this particular show.  In comparison, we can perform other well known musicals for the average rate of $4500 for that number of performances.  This is insane and an insult to educational theatre.  Other than obviously not giving them my business, do I have any recourse?  I have been told by Samuel French that they are simply the middle man and that the Estate and Authors are the ones that set these high prices.

Thanks!

Twelve thousand dollars? Or is that a typo? 

Tell SF that you will only use 500 seats, that may change the rate. We have  1300 seat auditorium and the royalties were app $1500.

We did Grease last year (the full version) and, to be honest, I don't find it a good show for high school students. It's very misogynist, the way to get your guy is to change for him, become slutty, don't be yourself. It sold great and we made a lot of money but I'd never recommend it.

Twelve thousand dollars? Or is that a typo? 

Tell SF that you will only use 500 seats, that may change the rate. We have  1300 seat auditorium and the royalties were app $1500.

We did Grease last year (the full version) and, to be honest, I don't find it a good show for high school students. It's very misogynist, the way to get your guy is to change for him, become slutty, don't be yourself. It sold great and we made a lot of money but I'd never recommend it.

I did Grease and The Moustrap this year.  Unfortunately, Samuel French owns the licensing rights  to both.  I found their royalties on both shows to be unreasonable and their procedures difficult. We asked our parent booster club to help with the initial cost on Grease. We sold out almost every night and our productions account account is at a healthy amount now.  I guess it was worth it financially.  

Here are the issues with Samuel French:   They do not take PO's which creates lots of issues with our bookkeeping, you must purchase the scripts separately from the music (which is in the very fine print of the contract), you must purchase the rights of any music from the movie from another company, Chappell-Warner, and you have to email them and wait several weeks for a response.  Samuel French will release music from the movie once they receive the email from Chappell-Warner. We did not get our "movie music" until 2 weeks before we opened.  The school version scripts are not very good. I will never direct Grease again. Ever.

On The Mousetrap, they wanted to charge us $750 for 4 nights.  Their catalog states that the royalty fee is $100 per night.  I had to ask for a royalty reduction because we never sell more than 300 seats per night on a non-musical show.  We went back and forth and they finally agreed to reduce the royalties by $150 total.  However, it took so long to get this accomplished, that I got an automatic email from their billing department saying they were cancelling our contract for non-payment 3 days before we opened. I ended up fedexing a check to them.  It was a nightmare.  Most theatre directors don't have a "staff" to handle these things.  

I have been doing this for about 10 years and I don't remember Samuel French being this difficult.  I will not work them again unless it is absolutely necessary.

I've done Grease once and would never recommend it for high school.  It gives off the wrong message.  In it's place I would highly recommend Happy Days, much better show.  Same time period, better characters.

And.... I would avoid working with SF at all costs.