Why the production of Enron bombed on Broadway

Irony always attended the prospect of Enron coming to Broadway. Here was one of the Great White Way's most expensive non-musical plays (a budget of $4m), and it aimed to indict capitalist excess. Americans still bruised from the recession were being asked to pay as much as $120 for a play about fiscal chicanery. And in the age of Obama, an English play that revisited the ascendance of Bush and the horror of 9/11. In hindsight, Enron should never have attempted a commercial run. So yesterday's closing notice wasn't such a shock. After a determinedly unengaged and reductive review in the New York Times, the production was all but assured a quick death. As a US critic who came out strongly in favour of the play's visual flair and wide-angle philosophical point that market forces shape (or distort) human progress, I am dismayed by this premature closing. But the play provoked a sharp backlash: in personal emails, blogs and even on my Facebook page, I found myself defending the work and my review against charges of shallowness. Why did Enron close? Failure has a thousand fathers. Broadway audiences don't want to pay top dollar for a feel-bad history lesson. The Tony awards snubbed it because the show has no national-tour potential. The marketing was vague and creepy. There were no stars. There was no rock music. But mainly, the New York Times was bored. Enron may have created a new category: the Snob Flop. Every season there's a Snob Hit on Broadway, usually a costumed classic (Mary Stuart) or a clever drama from the National (The History Boys). Enron took a US subject, cast US actors, and dressed them in business suits with velociraptor heads. It was smart, edgy and complex; it never stood a chance. • David Cote is theatre editor of Time Out New York .