Singapore Theatre in 2024

Rises and Falls

2024 is a significant year for Centre 42 - it marks ten years since we first opened our doors, as well as our eighth year creating the annual Singapore Theatre Timeline, which maps the wide variety of local theatre productions that have been staged over the course of one calendar year. We've done a lot of looking back and reflecting - on the past ten years of Centre 42's programmes; on the way the Singapore Theatre and Year in Review projects have evolved; and on Singapore theatre in 2024! 

In this article, we focus on that last point - our observations and analyses of the shape that local theatre has taken this year. We've looked at some data points for theatre in 2024, and compared them to data previously collected over the past eight years. Through the process, we've seen some interesting (and sometimes surprising) rises and falls! Keep reading to find out the notable increases or decreases in theatre-making - but before that, let's start with an overview of Singapore theatre in 2024.

The scene has staged a total of 150 shows, including:

• 149 in-person performances
• 1 hybrid performance (simultaneously performed live and online)

View this year's interactive timeline below! Click on the 'Full Screen' button in the embedded timeline for the best viewing experience; click and drag to explore different months of the year, and click on each individual production to find out more about it! Shows that were presented as part of a festival are grouped together under a blue festival heading and located in the bottom half of the timeline. 

Unable to view the interactive timeline? Check out the static versions below, available as an image and a PDF! 

Our first rise is visible in the total number of productions staged in 2024. Between 2017 and 2024, the highest recorded number of productions in one year was 220 in 2019. Between 2020 and 2022, this number decreased every year, with 2022 seeing 83 fewer productions as compared to 2019. This decrease was likely due to the many restrictions the theatre community faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, when lockdowns, social distancing, and global stress and uncertainty made it challenging to stage productions. 

Happily, it looks like we're seeing a rise in productions again! 2023 saw a slight increase in total productions as compared to 2022, and the number has risen again in 2024 to our final total of 150. We're excited to see if this number will continue to rise in 2025 and beyond! 

The number of new works presented each year has stayed stable since 2022, when the country and the theatre scene had mostly returned to 'normal' (a post-pandemic state of living). However, throughout the years, we've been seeing a gradual and consistent rise in what we term 'non-original work'. Here are some definitions to better understand this data, as presented in the graph below:

• 'New work' refers to works that have been newly created and have not been publicly read or staged before. Examples from 2024 include Secondary: The Musical by Checkpoint Theatre and no there there by Autopoetics.
• 'Non-original work' refers to works that have been publicly read or staged by a different organisation or artist (not the organisation or artist presenting it in 2024). Examples from 2024 include Little Shop of Horrors by Sing'theatre and A Super Happy Story (About Feeling Super Sad) by The Young Company. 
• 'Past work (restaging/adaptation)' refers to works that were previously created by the organisation or artist who has decided to restage or adapt the work, and re-present it in 2024. Examples from 2024 include The Last Gardener by The Theatre Practice and Forked by Jo Tan.

We've gone from 12 non-original works staged in 2020, to 28 non-original works staged in 2024, with the number rising every year! It seems that while the theatre scene continues to be interested in creating new works, the appetite for non-original works is steadily growing too. 

We've also seen a significant rise and fall when looking at who exactly is presenting all these works! Since 2020, we've been actively collecting data on the organisations and artists presenting local theatre productions. This year sees a rise in productions presented by registered companies (defined as theatre groups which are formally registered as companies under the Accounting and Corporate Regulatory Authority) - 100 out of 150 total productions, as compared to 93 in 2023. 

Conversely, we've also seen a fall in productions presented by independent artists. This number peaked in 2021 with 42 productions, possibly due to the increased financial support that independent artists could tap on via the National Arts Council's Self-Employed Person Grant. Productions presented by independent artists fell to 19 in 2022 and 20 in 2023. 2024 sees the steepest fall to only 7 productions presented by independent artists. It remains to be seen if this trend continues in 2025 and beyond.

The nature of our ticketing structures has remained relatively stable, with the exception of 2020, which saw a sharp rise in productions that were free to attend (many of these productions were digital productions, since live productions could not be staged during the 2020 pandemic lockdowns). Since 2021, the majority of productions have had fixed-price tickets, and this remains the case in 2024.

However, when it comes to fixed-price tickets, we've seen a significant fall in ticket prices this year! Ticket prices rose steeply between 2021 and 2023, with both the highest and lowest average ticket prices rising by a whopping $9 within the span of two years. It may come as a surprise that average ticket prices have bucked that trend and fallen in 2024! The highest average ticket price has decreased by 5.8%, from $47.08 to $44.33, and the lowest average ticket price has seen an even bigger percentage decrease at 17.6%, from $34.74 to $28.63. We think it's too early to say if tickets are becoming more affordable, though - check back in next year to see if the downward trend holds. 

For those who've been following our previous Singapore Theatre timelines, you'll know that we started tracking some new statistics in 2023 to collect more interesting and valuable data on our theatre scene. There've been a few notable rises and falls within just the span of one year, too!

We've seen a slight fall in the average number of performers in a production, from six in 2023 to five in 2024. Roughly 33% of productions in 2023 had more than the average number of performers in the cast, as compared to 28% of productions in 2024 - it seems like casts have been kept a little smaller across the board this year! 

Interestingly, though, we've had more performers in a single production this year compared to last year - The Theatre Practice's Four Horse Road topped the 2023 chart with 26 performers, while Temasek Polytechnic's Teatro featured 30 performers, and Wild Rice's Wizard of Oz featured 29! It appears that these large productions were the exception for the year, not the rule.

One very heartening rise we're excited to see comes in the form of productions offering access options for audiences with diverse needs! These include (but are not limited to):

• performance spaces that are wheelchair-accessible
• audio-described productions for audiences with visual impairments
• sign language interpretation provided for audiences with hearing impairments 
• relaxed productions, a catch-all term for productions which are adapted in various ways to make the theatrical experience more comfortable for audiences who may struggle with the atmosphere and environment of the original production
• content and trigger warnings provided to ensure audiences are aware of a production's content 
• crisis counsellors on-site, to ensure audiences have mental and emotional support after experiencing triggering content in a production

In 2023, 50 out of 142 productions provided access options - that's 29% of total productions. This has risen to 78 out of 150 productions in 2024, which is 52% of total productions. This means that over half of this year's theatre productions provided access options that made them more accessible to audiences with diverse needs, possibly bringing new audiences, who might not have been able to experience productions before, into the theatre community. We definitely hope this upward trend continues in 2025! 

We hope you enjoyed viewing the statistics and trends for Singapore Theatre in 2024 - view more infographics via this link!

Interested in reading more about the Singapore Theatre series, and the Year in Review project it was originally a part of? Click to check out our Singapore Theatre in 2017 - 2024: 8 Years of Year in Review article! 

RESEARCH & ANALYSIS
Adelyn Tan
Ash Chua
Cheng Xin Rui 

DESIGN & LAYOUT
Adelyn Tan
Ash Chua 
Jaclyn Chong

DATA VISUALISATION TOOLS
Timegraphics
Canva

Published: 27 December 2024