Lea Michele Already Turning Things Around For 'Funny Girl', Ticket Prices Skyrocket!

Getting a ticket to see Lea Michele's first performance as Fanny Brice may set fans back a couple hundred or thousand dollars. The ticket prices have skyrocketed with the exciting news that the ex "Glee" star would be the new lead character of "Funny Girl."

The actress and singer officially step in as Fanny Brice for the Broadway musical on September 6th, and tickets go for $570 to $2,250 on SeatGeek. While fans believe the prices are way more than usual, the site has classified them as low to moderate because of the unexpected surge. 

The high prices surprised fans as very few shows outside "Hamilton," which sold for $1,100 at a time, have experienced a surge like this. Michele is even more excited to see fans and perform on stage.

Keep reading to find out more.

Per SeatGeek, the official online ticket seller for the show, tickets sold in July and August for $69 and $49 on most weekdays. However, "Funny Girl's" average price of admission increased and went up to $101.84 each on Broadway League. 

This surprised fans as the show's box office income lagged before Michele's casting. In July, the August Wilson Theater was filled by just 74.84% for the show, an obvious drop from a few months earlier when the show had the Theater 97.8% full. Fans and critics also compared it to other shows, which regularly filled the Theater by 84%, 90%, and even 100% by "Hamilton."

The show's current production is now receiving strong ticket sales and gaining the attention of fans despite several negative reviews. In an article covering the show, Variety referred to "Funny Girl" as "uninspired."

Before this, many had lost hope in the show. New York Times reported that the original casting for Fanny Brice, Barbra Streisand, had set the bar too high, and Beanie Feldstein, who Michele replaced, failed to reach it. "You root for her to raise the roof, but she only bumps against it a little."

When its performance started in April, the show was very successful, grossing about $1.2 million per week, per the Broadway League. However, it went down to about $700,000, and fans started to lose interest. 

At the 2022 Tony Awards in June, this was obvious as "Funny Girl" was almost entirely snubbed. The musical received only one nomination for Jared Grimes, a featured actor who plays tap dancer Eddie Ryan. 

Fans believed that the decline in sales made the production team take a new direction with the show. Last weekend, Feldstein announced that she'd be leaving the show earlier than expected on July 31st, about two months before the original plan. When asked why she noted that the production decided "to take the show in a different direction."

Before leaving, Feldstein took to IG to leave a parting message for fans. She wrote, "Playing Fanny Brice on Broadway has been a lifelong dream of mine, and doing so for the last few months has been a great joy and true honor. Once the production decided to take the show in a different direction, I made the extremely difficult decision to step away sooner than anticipated."

A day after, the production confirmed that Michele would be taking over as the invincible Jewish character, Fanny Brice. In the past, Michele has expressed her love for the show on several occasions. In the 2009 musical series "Glee," the musical served as a reference for Michele's character Rachel Berry as she sang "Don't Rain on My Parade" and other songs from the show.

She even noted in an appearance on "Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen" in 2017 that she'd love to revive "Funny Girl," but she wasn't sure it was the right time. After Feldstein was cast a year ago, Michele's name trended for a while on Twitter. Fans are happy she finally gets the chance to live her dream.

Excited about her new role, Michele wrote to fans on Instagram, "A dream come true is an understatement." Fans congratulated the 35-year-old on a new part of her Broadway journey, which started when she was only eight. 

She starred as Cosette's Younger self in "Les Misérables" and returned at 20 for "Spring Awakening." However, the actor left the spotlight around 2020 after Samantha Marie Ware, her former "Glee" co-star, accused her of "traumatic microaggressions" on the set of the series. In response, Michele apologized to her "for any pain which [she had] caused."

Another "Glee" co-star Jane Lynch, who played Fanny's mom, is also leaving the show earlier than expected and will be replaced by Tovah Feldshuh, four-time Tony nominee, on September 6th.