Sep 5, 2023
ABBA Voyage’ Looks to Extend Residency (and Turn a Profit)
Mark Sutherland —
Money money money… As ABBA once pointed out, it’s a rich man’s world. But even after the runaway success of the “ABBA Voyage” digital live experience in London, producers say it has yet to recoup the extraordinary investment needed to put on the show.
“No, we haven’t broken even,” says producer Svana Gisla. “I don’t even know if we’re halfway to breaking even! The audacity of how much this show costs – it was all a bit mad. But we will get there…”
The smash hit show, staged in a purpose-built arena in London’s Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park, welcomed its one-millionth visitor back in April and is still playing to joyful, sold-out houses every night, 15 months after it first launched. It’s now booking through May 2024 in London and Gisla, fellow producer Ludvig Andersson, and director Baillie Walsh all hope to prolong that stay further.
“If we can extend the lease and we’re still selling tickets, then hopefully it will run as long as ‘Mamma Mia!’ or longer,” Walsh tells Variety. “I’d love it to be going into its 20th year with me as an old codger, walking with a stick, but still enjoying the audience singing along.”
Despite ABBA’s massive financial investment and the band’s pan-generational fanbase, the team tell Variety that launching the show still carried a huge element of risk. “I’m so proud of all of us for having pulled it off,” says Gisla.
However, they have an even bigger plan – the trio are quietly contemplating expanding the show. The potential to update the show is being explored, while there have been rumors of possible openings in Las Vegas and elsewhere. Earlier this year, Universal Music Group CEO Lucian Grainge told his company’s earnings call that “Plans are now in development to take ‘ABBA Voyage’ around the world,” but Andersson notes it’s not quite that simple.
“In the sense of going on the road, it was never an option, because it’s just too big and heavy of a thing,” he says. “You can’t move it around. What you can do is, do the same thing somewhere else and we’ve been looking at that for a long time. There are still options out there, but nothing is set in stone. And if that is North America, South-East Asia or Australasia, we’ll see – but we’re absolutely working on it.”
Gisla adds that the cost of the show remains a hurdle for many locations. “Everyone’s interested until you put the budget in front of them and say, ‘How about that?’” she laughs. “You can’t just pop up in some theater in Vegas, put some lights up and put digital ABBA on stage.”
The team explains the expense is also likely to deter most other artists from developing a similar experience. “People have been in touch, but you’ve got to be a band of a certain stature to even contemplate it,” says Walsh. “Luckily, ABBA are that creatively curious that they wanted to go ahead despite the enormous expense.”
“We haven’t really invented anything,” adds Andersson. “We just did a thing – and it turned out to be a beautiful thing. But there’s no blueprint here that you can take and go, ‘Ok, let’s just do this with another artist’. If you think of it like that, my advice would be that that’s a terrible idea.”
Gisla says the members of ABBA often attend the show incognito and are rarely recognized. But despite the success of Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson and Anni-Frid Lyngstad’s digital versions, Baillie Walsh says he can’t see avatar shows ever rivaling traditional touring.
“People are always going to want to play live,” he says. “We’ve proved you can get emotion from the
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abba voyage 2023 - notes
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