Broadway Grosses Week Ending May 24 2026: Season Finale
Broadway Grosses — Week Ending May 24, 2026: The Final Week of the Season, a House Record for Every Brilliant Thing, and a $1.91 Billion Year
Week 52 of the 2025-26 Broadway season belonged to Daniel Radcliffe’s farewell performance in Every Brilliant Thing — which set a new house record at the Hudson Theatre for the second consecutive week — while Memorial Day weekend lifted the overall industry gross to $40.7 million, capping a season that broke records for the second consecutive year.
Week 52: The Last Week of the Season — Memorial Day, Radcliffe’s Farewell, and a Fire
The week ending 24 May 2026 was the final week of the 2025-26 Broadway season — Week 52 of a standard 52-week schedule — and it delivered one of the more dramatic curtain calls in recent memory. The Saturday and Sunday of Memorial Day weekend fell within this reporting window, generating the uptick in tourism-driven attendance that the holiday reliably produces. The 40 running productions collectively grossed $40,707,260 — a 6.7 percent increase over the prior week’s $38,166,527 and a rise in attendance of 6.2 percent to 336,648 theatregoers.
Two notable disruptions shaped the week’s numbers. Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman played a planned seven-performance week rather than the standard eight — a scheduled reduction built into its final weeks. More dramatically, The Book of Mormon went dark entirely when a fire broke out at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre, forcing the cancellation of all that week’s performances. The iconic Trey Parker and Matt Stone satirical musical was expected to reopen on 27 May.
Compared to Week 52 of the previous season, overall grosses were down 8.2 percent from $44,351,676 — though this comparison requires important context. The 2024-25 season was a 53-week season (Broadway’s occasional “leap year” to align with the calendar year), meaning that week also fell at a different seasonal moment. On a per-week basis, the 2025-26 season’s overall economics were broadly comparable to its predecessor.
The average paid admission for this final week was $120.92 — a decrease of $10.89 compared to the same week last year and $0.49 above the prior week. The gap between this week’s average and last year’s reflects the general trend throughout the 2025-26 season: while total season grosses set a new record, average ticket prices were somewhat lower than in the record-breaking 2024-25 season, with the increase driven primarily by higher attendance in certain productions rather than higher prices across the board.
🚨 Notable Disruption — Book of Mormon Dark This Week
The Eugene O’Neill Theatre fire caused The Book of Mormon to cancel all performances for the week ending 24 May 2026 — a rare complete production blackout for one of Broadway’s most consistent long-running earners. The show was expected to resume 27 May. No injuries were reported. The Eugene O’Neill Theatre is one of Broadway’s most historic venues, seating 1,094 and hosting some of the most celebrated productions of recent decades.
Every Brilliant Thing Leads the Week — and Sets the Hudson Record
The undisputed story of the week’s box office was Every Brilliant Thing at the Hudson Theatre, which led all Broadway productions with a gross of $2,296,473 — the highest gross ever recorded by any play at the Hudson Theatre, and a figure it set for the second consecutive week. The milestone reflects the extraordinary commercial momentum of Daniel Radcliffe’s final performances in the role of the unnamed narrator: the Tony-nominated performance that has been the cultural centrepiece of the late-season Broadway conversation.
Radcliffe played his final performance as the narrator on Sunday 24 May 2026 — the last night of the season — before handing the role to Emmy Award-winner Mariska Hargitay, who began her Broadway debut in the same role on Tuesday 26 May. The farewell performance generated a wave of media coverage and social media response, with audience members describing standing ovations of unusual intensity and a communal atmosphere unlike anything they had experienced at the Hudson Theatre during the run. The box office reflects that intensity: at a production originally capitalised for a limited engagement, a weekly gross of $2.3 million is a genuinely remarkable figure.
The show’s average ticket price for this final week was Broadway’s highest of any production — reflecting both the demand for Radcliffe’s farewell and the premium pricing strategy that had sustained the show’s commercial performance throughout its run.
🏆 House Record — Hudson Theatre
Every Brilliant Thing set the all-time house record at the Hudson Theatre for the week ending 24 May 2026 — $2,296,473 — the highest gross in the venue’s history. This was the second consecutive week the production set the record, having also set it the previous week.
It’s heartening to see not one but two of the season’s newest productions atop the list of top grossers as we head into the Tony Awards season — though new musicals are still trailing the straight plays Every Brilliant Thing and Death of a Salesman in the final week’s top rankings.
Playbill, Broadway Grosses Analysis, 27 May 2026Top Grossers — Week Ending May 24, 2026
The top five productions of the week were led by Every Brilliant Thing in a commanding first place, with the long-running stalwarts Hamilton and The Lion King filling second and third — both benefiting from Memorial Day weekend tourist traffic — and Death of a Salesman and MJ The Musical rounding out the top five. The new season productions Ragtime and The Lost Boys came in just below, nearly tied as the week’s top-grossing new musicals at approximately $1.3 million each.
| # | Show | Theatre | Weekly Gross | vs Prior Wk | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Every Brilliant Thing | Hudson Theatre | $2,296,473 | ↑↑ | All-time Hudson Theatre record (2nd consecutive week) · Radcliffe final performances |
| 2 | Hamilton | Richard Rodgers | $2,040,000 | ↑ | Memorial Day weekend boost · Notable six-figure week-over-week gain |
| 3 | The Lion King | Minskoff Theatre | $2,000,000 | ↑ | Consistent top-five performer · Holiday weekend tourist boost |
| 4 | Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman | Winter Garden | $1,640,000 | — | 7-performance week (planned) · Tony-nominated production |
| 5 | MJ The Musical | Neil Simon Theatre | $1,600,000 | ↑ | Strong tourist week performance |
| 6 | Ragtime | Vivian Beaumont | ~$1,300,000 | ↑ | Top-grossing new musical of the week · 11 Tony nominations |
| 7 | The Lost Boys | TBC | ~$1,300,000 | ↑ | Nearly tied with Ragtime · 12 Tony nominations (leading) |
| — | Wicked | Gershwin Theatre | Notable gain | ↑↑ | Notable six-figure week-over-week gain noted by Playbill |
| — | Stranger Things: First Shadow | Broadway Theatre | Notable gain | ↑↑ | Notable six-figure week-over-week gain |
| — | Harry Potter and the Cursed Child | Lyric Theatre | Notable gain | ↑↑ | Notable six-figure week-over-week gain |
| — | Oh, Mary! (Maya Rudolph) | Lyceum Theatre | Highest ever | ↑↑↑ | Maya Rudolph’s debut gave the show its highest gross of the entire run |
| — | The Book of Mormon | Eugene O’Neill | $0 | DARK | Zero performances due to fire at Eugene O’Neill Theatre |
Note: Individual show grosses are sourced from The Broadway League via Playbill, BroadwayWorld, Broadway News, and Deadline. Some figures are approximated from percentage change data and context reporting where precise individual figures were not separately itemised.
Oh, Mary! and the Maya Rudolph Effect
One of the week’s most commercially significant stories was the performance of Oh, Mary! at the Lyceum Theatre under its newest star, Maya Rudolph, who began her Broadway debut in the title role on 28 April 2026. The six-time Emmy Award winner’s debut week smashed the show’s previous all-time box office record, and the production continued to ride that momentum through the final week of the season.
Rudolph’s run — initially scheduled through 20 June but extended through 5 July 2026 — has confirmed what the show’s producer Kevin McCollum identified as the “Maya Rudolph effect”: a first-night box office surge so strong that it broke two all-time Lyceum Theatre records in the debut week alone. The show, which has now been running since July 2024, has broken its own box office record thirteen times in total — a commercial consistency matched by very few shows in Broadway history.
The 2025-26 Season Closes: A $1.91 Billion Record
With the final week’s grosses now confirmed, The Broadway League released the official 2025-26 season total on 27 May 2026, confirming a new record: $1,910,903,835 across 52 weeks — a 1 percent increase over last season’s $1,892,650,959, which itself was a record at the time. Broadway has now set a new season gross record for two consecutive years.
The full season statistics paint a picture of an industry in sustained, if modestly paced, commercial growth:
The season featured 74 productions, of which 35 opened during the season itself. Those 35 new productions included 12 musicals (six original, four revivals, and two return engagements) and 21 plays (14 original and seven revivals), plus two special engagements. The 35 productions together played 13,416 performances, with audiences filling 90.8 percent of available seats — a strong occupancy figure that reflects the quality of the season’s slate and the continued health of demand for Broadway.
The average ticket price across the full season was $131.09 — compared to $138.20 in the same week last year, reflecting a modest decline in average prices even as total grosses rose, a dynamic explained by stronger attendance volume in lower-priced seats and in productions with more accessible pricing structures.
Broadway’s president, speaking on the season results, described the record as evidence that “Broadway is more than just entertainment. Every production supports not only the artists and crews on stage and backstage, but also the restaurants, hotels, retail shops, transportation workers, and small businesses that rely on the energy Broadway brings to New York City.” The Broadway League noted that the industry continues to support nearly 100,000 jobs throughout the New York region.
📈 2025-26 Season in Numbers
Total Gross: $1,910,903,835 · ↑ 1% vs 2024-25 · Attendance: 14,577,322 · ↓ 0.6% vs last season · Productions: 74 total, 35 opened this season · Performances: 13,416 · Occupancy: 90.8% · Avg Ticket: $131.09
Year-Over-Year: Why the 1% Gain Is More Impressive Than It Looks
A 1 percent increase in total season gross might seem modest, but it deserves context that makes it considerably more impressive. The 2024-25 season was a 53-week season — Broadway’s occasional “leap year” that occurs approximately every seven years to realign the season calendar with the standard calendar year. Having 53 opportunities to gross ticket revenue rather than 52 represents an approximately 2 percent structural advantage for last season.
When adjusted for the extra week — comparing 52-week seasons properly — the 2025-26 season’s per-week average gross was actually higher than last season’s. The industry grew on a like-for-like basis even as the headline comparison suggests only marginal change.
The slight attendance decline of 0.6 percent reflects a national trend in which ticket prices are rising faster than seat occupancy is growing — a dynamic familiar from the live entertainment industry broadly. More people are paying more for Broadway tickets than at any point in history, even if slightly fewer people in total are going. The sustainability of that model depends on the continued production of shows with sufficient commercial appeal to sustain premium pricing — and the 2025-26 season, with Wicked‘s ongoing records, Every Brilliant Thing‘s house records, and Oh, Mary!‘s thirteen box office bests, demonstrated that such productions continue to arrive.
What Comes Next: The Tony Awards and the Start of a New Season
The end of the 2025-26 Broadway season does not mean the end of Broadway activity — far from it. The 79th Annual Tony Awards take place on 7 June 2026 at Radio City Music Hall, broadcast live on CBS, and will honour the season that just concluded. With The Lost Boys and Schmigadoon! leading the nominations with 12 each, and Ragtime close behind with 11, the ceremony promises to be one of the most contested in recent memory. Host: P!NK.
Productions currently running will continue through the summer — most notably Every Brilliant Thing with Mariska Hargitay, then Tracee Ellis Ross; Oh, Mary! with Maya Rudolph through 5 July; and the long-running stalwarts Hamilton, The Lion King, Wicked, and Aladdin. Several Tony-season productions will close in June and July before the 2026-27 season begins in earnest in September.
The first official productions of the 2026-27 season begin arriving in September 2026, with School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre and the long-anticipated Dreamgirls revival — directed and choreographed by Camille A. Brown — following in the fall. The season promises to be one of the most diverse and ambitious in recent memory.
For the week ending 24 May 2026, the numbers confirm a season that delivered on the promise of its exceptional slate: record grosses, a packed house for farewell performances, Memorial Day momentum, and — in Daniel Radcliffe’s final bow as the narrator of Every Brilliant Thing — a genuinely historic theatrical moment to close the curtain on one of Broadway’s finest years.
