It’s time to discuss a serious illness affecting performers everywhere. It is a phenomenon commonly called post-show-depression, and caused by a show’s run ending. Mostly it affects people who are in the show. Symptoms include, but are not limited to: lack of interest in normal activities, increased desire to listen to Broadway soundtracks, strange dreams involving missing cues or forgetting lines, and excessive tiredness. Some people try to live with the pain, suffering in silence. But there is only one treatment, and that is talking incessantly about what ever show is coming up next. This has the almost unavoidable side effect of making you sound super conceited and making everyone not want to talk to you. Talking about it helps relieve sadness, but everyone else only hears “I’m going to make it and you are not”. It is very off putting. So remember, when suffering from post-show-depression, remember you are not alone, so don’t drive those people away.
As of 2010, Playbill reported that the longest running shows in American musical theater history include The Phantom of the Opera, Les Miserables, Chicago, Beauty and the Beast, Rent, The Lion King, Miss Saigon and 42nd Street.
