Les Mis Tour meetup?

[Roses for Ophelia]

...so i guess I have to make the thread.

Right, so there are currently vague plans to have a meet up to see the american tour of les mis. we've been sort of discussing it on collectingbees' LJ, but let's have a thread here too, just to have it all in one place.

So here are the tour dates.

Millburn, NJ Paper Mill Playhouse November 19-December 19, 2010
Philadelphia, PA Kimmel Center January 4-16, 2011
Fort Lauderdale, FL Broward Center January 18-30, 2011
Baltimore, MD Hippodrome March 1-6, 2011
Louisville, KY Kentucky Center March 8-13, 2011
Columbus, OH Ohio Theatre March 15-20, 2011
Detroit, MI Fisher Theatre March 22-April 3, 2011
Cleveland, OH Palace Theatre/PlayhouseSquare April 5-17, 2011
Fayetteville, AR Walton Center May 3-8, 2011
Salt Lake City, UT Capitol Theatre May 24-June 5, 2011


Who might be able to come, and where can you get to? Personally, i'm STRONGLY leaning towards the NJ Papermill, though i COULD make philly....maybe. Mme. Bahorel brought up it'd probably be tough to get good seats for a large group at short notice, but you never know! It really depends on how many of us there are. I would also like to point out it's staying at the Papermill the longest time. More days=more possible days we could get the tickets.

So what's the verdict?!

[hazellwood]

It may be possible for me to make Portland, Los Angeles or Salt Lake. No way for me to make anything on the East Coast, though.

[collectingbees]

I would be down for Philly or Baltimore. Papermill is now out for me. :/

[MmeJavert]

I can make Papermill, Philly, and Baltimore. Probably not all three, however. Philly may even be the easiest for me but mostly it'll depend on a lot of stuff (cost, seats available, meetup possibilities, etc.) -- besides there's at least one show I want to see at Hershey this season so ... I'll try to be at one or two of them, anyway!

[April Aubade]

Philly would be the easiest for me, considering I can just hop on the subway, but New Jersey would work, too. I know I'm not really a frequent poster (I'm horribly shy), but I would still really enjoy a meet-up and am much less awkward in real life than I am on the internet hahah.

[sophiedegrouchy]

I'm hoping to make it at least once to Papermill and once to Philly, ideally with other people. I'll post some possible dates once I'm back on campus and have some idea of what my schedule's going to look like.

I'm afraid that only weekend (or maybe Friday evening) times will work for me at Papermill. 'Cause, y'know, classes. Philly will be...interesting, because it's over my reading period/finals, which will (probably) mean no classes but OHSHIT work/exams, so. And I'll probably buy a ticket beforehand instead of trying for student rush, because I'd really rather not risk wasting the time and money (curse you, increased NJTransit fares!) for nothing.

Bees et al - would you mind if I LJ friended you for ease of planning and communication?

[Satirist]

I'm going to the LA one!! *Ahem* I have a confession to make: It's going to be my first time seeing Les Miz live. I know, I know. Shameful! But, uh, poor college student who grew up with crazy, insanely strict parents, so yeah...I'm very excited!!

EDIT: Unfortunately, I can only make the LA show. Anything else is out of the question. Sorry.

[Euphrasie]

I'm definitely going to be seeing the NJ one with my dad a lot, so I'm in.

[Roses for Ophelia]

So this sort of died, for a while, didn't it? But we must not give up! From what's written here, and focusing on East Coast only, for the moment, we have

2 people who are only for NJ
1 Philly only
3 for Philly OR NJ

(shall we forget Baltimore? since the only people who mentioned it also mentioned Philly.)

Can anyone else make either of these cities?

So which should it be? Shall we plan two separate meetups?

I propose that whichever city we pick we try for a matinee, so we don't have to worry about traveling TOO late at night, and if we can magically make it a Wednesday matinee we should, since those are RARELY as sold out as evening preformances. I don't know what the state of the tickets are for Philly, but i'm sure there's pleanty left, and the run at the Papermill is a month long, so there should be plenty left as well. This doesn't seem to be TOO big of a group, so i doubt we'll have trouble getting tickets.

(I really suck at planning things)

[MmeJavert]

a few thoughts:

1) It has to be a weekend, otherwise I can't make it, and I'd bet anyone else who has school/work won't be able to either. I just think that planning meetups during the week is a recipe for failure for anyone who doesn't live VERY close to the actual performance venue. Papermill is a 3 hour drive for me, Philly about 1 hour 45 minutes, and Baltimore about 2 hours. I am willing to do these on the weekends, but during the week I have to work.

2) You often need 10-15 or more people for group rates through the box office. We should really plan to buy our own tickets in advance, and meet up for dinner before/after the show and possibly during intermission, or to try for day-of tickets depending on how well it sells. I'm all up for buying ahead of time. But if there's, say, eight of us, there's a good chance we won't be able to sit together no matter how well we plan it.

3) I'd be fine with going to both Philly and Papermill, depending on cashflow. If not both then I'll be at Philly because it's a lot closer.

[hazellwood]

Although you are not discussing this right now, the only possible thing I could make would be Portland.

//scampers away

[MmeBahorel]

In Philly, it'll be at the Academy of Music, and right now, the website doesn't have an on-sale date listed. Tickets usually go on sale about 8 weeks prior to show date. (Groups are a minimum of 20, so we will definitely not qualify.) They also are not showing ticket prices yet.

I'm in for either Saturday matinee, so January 8 or January 15. (I already have tickets for a 7 pm show on Sunday the 9th, so I can't make it back from Philly in time for that.)

[MmeBahorel]

Ok, we have an onsale date for Philly: November 5.

It looks like tickets are ranging from $20 for obstructed view and way high up to $100 for front on the floor. Seating charts for the Academy of Music here. (admittedly, I dug in pretending to be ordering a subscription in order to get the ticket prices.) This is for a Saturday matinee, which I would assume would be as high as they will go (and the easiest time for everyone to make it in). The first week is subscription week, so availability would theoretically be better on the 15th than on the 8th, as they are trying to get subscribers, who have been able to buy tickets for ages, in that first week.

Baltimore has no onsale date yet (will probably be around the beginning of the year) but Ticketmaster at least has the prices up, $30 for balcony to $75 for floor, it looks like (plus nasty Ticketmaster fees, which they are kindly tacking on to the prices: see here. Baltimore only has the show for one week, so there is no avoiding subscribers.

In other words, we have a month before tickets need to be purchased for Philly and probably two months after that for Baltimore.

[Roses for Ophelia]

So are we definatly doing Philly?

[SylvieProuvaire1832]

I could do either NJ, Philly, or Baltimore pretty easily.