He is the man who brought SPIDER-MAN back from the brink. In a feature out yesterday, the New York Times profiles Michael Cohl, the man about which we have heard little, but who is responsible for resurrecting the most expensive and, for some, most highly anticipated Broadway show in history. Cohl stepped into the role of lead producer on the mega-musical in the fall of 2009 after a significant investment in the show fell out, leaving the production stifled and dry. A former music tour promoter for U2 and the Rolling Stones, Cohl was recruited by SPIDER-MAN composers Bono and The Edge to reinvigorate the production. And reinvigorate it he has, with previews officially scheduled to begin in just months on November 14, 2010.
Cohl explains of the experience: "As long as you don't think about the whole big picture, producing ‘Spider-Man' is a fantastic experience...But once you look up and see it all, it looks very, very scary."
After all, the Times notes: "The show's business structure, confirmed for the first time by Mr. Cohl, is an enormous theatrical gamble. The cost of the musical, widely reported to be $50 million, will have grown by an additional $10 million when all expenses are accounted for, Mr. Cohl said. He expected the running costs of "Spider-Man" to be slightly under $1 million a week - meaning that the show would need to have blockbuster sales on the scale of the top-grossing musical "Wicked" if he and his investors were to see a profit from the Broadway production alone."
To read the full report, click here.
SPIDER-MAN stars Reeve Carney, Jennifer Damiano, Patrick Page, Natalie Mendoza, Michael Mulheren, Ken Marks, Isabel Keating, Jeb Brown, T.V. Carpio, Mat Devine, Gideon Glick, Jonathan Schwartz, Matthew James Thomas, Laura Beth Wells, Matt Caplan, DWayne Clark, Luther Creek, Gerald Avery, Collin Baja, Marcus Bellamy, Emmanuel Brown, Erin Elliott, Dana Marie Ingraham, Ayo Janeen Jackson, Heather Lang, Ari Loeb, Natalie Lomonte, Kevin Loomis, Kristin Martin, Jodi McFadden, Kristen Oei, America Olivo, Jennifer Perry, Kyle Post, Brandon Rubendall, Sean Samuels, Dollar Tan, and Christopher Tierney.
