Want to see The Lion King on Broadway? Now, you can enter a lottery for a shot at cheap tickets.
On Thursday, Disney announced that the 18-year-running musical will begin offering an online lottery for $30 tickets. The average ticket price last week for the New York City production was more than $130 each, according to the New York Times.
The move comes as Broadway shows are increasingly offering lotteries to give theatergoers the opportunity to attend shows that may be too pricey otherwise.
The Lion King is Broadway’s third-longest-running show. Most weeks, according to the Times, it’s Broadway’s highest-grossing production. Last year, the Associated Press estimated that the musical earned over $6.2 billion over the course of its run, beating out Phantom of the Opera’s $6 billion in worldwide sales.
Entries to the Lion King ticket lottery will be accepted each evening before a performance until 9 a.m. the following morning, and winners will be notified immediately. They’ll have an hour window to pay for the tickets. The number and quality of the seats will vary by show, according to the Washington Post.
“For many years we have explored ways to make more affordable tickets to The Lion King available to the public,” Andrew Flatt, senior vice president at Disney Theatrical Productions, said in a statement to the Times. “But when we’ve tried a student rush in the past, some ticket brokers purchased the tickets at the rush price and resold them for much more than their face value.”
The Lion King will attempt to deter scalpers by giving lottery winners just a 30-minute window before the show to pick up their tickets.
