Today we have prepared for you a selection of theatrical productions that have made it into the Guinness Book of World Records. The material is from past Guinness Books, so some information may be out of date. We hope this does not spoil the reading experience!
Most expensive stage production
The stage version of Disney’s The Lion King, which premiered on Broadway in November 1997, was the most expensive theatrical production ever. Its budget was $15 million.
Biggest theatrical receipts
Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical The Phantom of the Opera has played in 18 countries and grossed $3.2 billion since its October 9, 1986 premiere at the Theatre Royal (London, UK). The second highest-grossing theater performance is the same Lloyd Webber musical, Cats, which grossed $2 billion.
Longest stage life
Agatha Christie’s play “The Mousetrap” premiered on November 25, 1952. By April 23, 2001, it had been performed 126 times at the St. Martin’s Theatre (London, UK). In 49 years it grossed $33.3 million at the box office and was seen by about 10 million viewers.
The greatest number of Tony Awards.
Harold Prince (USA) has won 20 Tony Awards in 40 years. This award is named after the theater actress Antoinette Perry and is one of the most prestigious in the theater world. The full name of the award is the Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Theatre.
Biggest performance insurance
The musical Barnum, which premiered at London’s Palladium on June 11, 1981, was insured for the largest sum of money in the theater’s history. It totaled $9,867,000 at the rate of those days, of which actor Michael Crawford was insured for $3 million. During the performance, he was walking on a wire and rappelling down to the stage from the topmost box.
Musical Champion
The off-Broadway musical The Fantasticks by Americans Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt premiered on May 3, 1960. By 2000 the number of its performances at the Sullivan Street Playhouse (New York, USA) had reached a record 16,562.
The highest number of tap dancers was.
On August 17, 1997, outside the Macy’s department store in New York City, 6,776 people tap-danced to the beat of “Puttin’ On The Ritz” for two minutes. The stage for this event was 34th Street. Participants ranged in age from 1 to 91.
Grandest Failure.
On May 17, 1988, the musical “Carrie,” produced by the Royal Shakespeare Company and costing $7 million, was withdrawn after 5 performances on Broadway (New York, USA). “King,” a musical about Martin Luther King, lost $5,128,200 in the 6 weeks of performances that ended on June 2, 1990, equaling the record London failure of the 1988 production of “Ziegfeld.”
Longest play.
The longest theatrical production is Neil Oram’s (U.K.) Perversion. The 10-act play premiered at the Institute of Modern Art (London, UK) on January 18-20, 1979. The performance lasted 18 hours and 5 minutes. All that time, with the exception of 5 minutes, actor Russell Denton was on stage.
The fastest theatrical production
The musical “Oklahoma!” directed by Velvet Jacket Limited was performed at the Playhouse Theatre (Edinburgh, UK). Its production took 23 hours and 55 minutes after cast selection and initial familiarity with the text was shown at 8 p.m. on May 6, 2000.
Highest number of actors hovering in the air at the same time
In the show “Period at Home” of the Argentine dance theater “De la garda” there were 33 actors hanging in the air at the same time. In April 1998, 14,000 people watched five performances of this show at a velodrome in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
The most active participant in the creation of the play
In the play Money or Love, staged at the Grand Theatre (Lancaster, UK) in September 2000 by the Lancaster Red Rose Society of Opera and Drama Lovers, Phil Gibson was the original idea writer, composer, librettist, chorus conductor, orchestrator and lead role performer.
Actress winner of the most Tony Awards
Julie Harris (USA) won the first Tony Award in 1952. Now, along with an award for her contributions to the arts, she has five – more than any other actress. Julie Harris also holds the record for the most Tony nominations – 10 in 45 years. She made her Broadway debut in 1945.
Shortest play.
Nobel laureate Samuel Beckett of Ireland, author of one of the most famous plays of postwar theater, “Waiting for Godot,” wrote the world’s shortest play, the 30-second “Breath” (1969).
The most Tony Award-winning plays
The five Tony Award-winning plays are Robert Bolt’s A Man for All Seasons (1962), Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf (1963), Robert Marasco’s Child’s Play (1971), Peter Schaffer’s Amadeus (1981) and Tom Stoppard’s The Present (1984).
The greatest number of reworkings of the play
The one-act farce “A Day Well Spent,” written by John Oxenford in 1835, is the basis for five plays: Johannes Nestroy’s 1842 “Such a Wimp”, Thornton Wilder’s “Merchant of Yonkers” in 1938, his “Matchmaker” in 1938, Herman and Michael Stewart’s “Hello, Dolly” in 1963 and Tom Stoppard’s “All the Way” in 1981.
Passion for Flying.
Performing a trick called “sunori” in Japan, kabuki theater actor Ichikawa Ennosuke (Japan) flies over the stage and the audience. He has done this in 5,000 performances since April 1968. He made his anniversary flight on April 19, 2000, at 3:03 p.m. at the Shimbashi Ibujo Theater in Tokyo during a performance of Shin Sankokushi. Ennosuke’s character dies and ascends to heaven with his beloved. “Sunori,” performed with blocks and straps, was invented in Edo (present-day Tokyo) in the 17th century and has been used in theater productions for three centuries. Ennosuke resurrected the trick at the Tokyo National Theater for the play “Yoshitsune and the Thousand Cherry Trees” and continued to perform it in various productions for 32 years.
The thickest layer of makeup
“Shatti” is a unique makeup that is used in Indian Kathakali dance theater. It is made of rice paste and paper and reaches 15 cm in thickness.
Around the world
At 7 p.m. Nov. 20, 1999, a children’s performance of “The Rainbow Juggler” began simultaneously in 56 theaters in Great Britain, Ireland, Germany, the United States and Australia. It was attended by 4,568 Stagecoach Theatre Arts students. The action commemorated the 10th anniversary of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child. The proceeds – $78,947 – went to the UNESCO Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
The greatest number of roles played
Ian Layton (USA) holds the first place by the number of roles played in theater, cinema and television. Since 1951 he has played 3,395 different roles. His dressing room has over 200 wigs and hats, about 70 pairs of glasses, 5 Sight-Claus costumes and 36 smoking pipes.
Highest number of appearances on stage in the same role
Between November 1966 and June 1983, actor Kanbi Fujiyama (Japan) played the lead role 10,288 times in the same play by the comedy troupe Soshiku Shikigek.
Highest number of plays by a single author running simultaneously
In 1908 Somerset Maugham set a record in this category. His plays Lady Frederick at the Court Theatre, Mrs. Dot at the Comedy, Jack Straw at the Vaudeville, and The Explorer at the Lyric ran simultaneously in London’s Westend district.
High Chairs.
On October 16, 1999, the Beijing Acrobats (China) built a 6.4-meter high pyramid of 6 people balancing on 7 chairs, the tallest in the world, and held a handstand for 5 seconds. The Beijing Acrobats Troupe was created in 1952 and their art dates back to the Qin Dynasty (225-207 B.C.).
Vietnamese Victory
Alan Babil and Claude-Michel Schonberg’s musical Miss Saigon, produced by Cameron McIntosh (UK), premiered on Broadway in April 1991, setting a box office record for musicals of $36 million, with 44 actors, a 1959 Cadillac and a real helicopter. The musical had its world premiere at London’s Theatre Royal on September 20, 1989. The premiere in Tokyo (Japan) took place in May 1992 and broke all box office records and the number of performances in Japan.