OTTAWA (CelebrityAccess MediaWire) — A pair of cancelled concerts cost the City of Ottawa and SuperEx, an eleven day exhibition held annually in the Canadian capital almost 100,000 dollars in fees, the Ottawa Citizen reported.
The two concerts, one by Michael Bolton scheduled for August 21st and the other by Gregory Charles slated for August 25th at the Civic Center were scrapped due to poor ticket sales. According to the Citizen, only around 200 tickets had been sold for each event, prompting organizers at Landsdowne Park and SuperEx to pull the plug.
Tickets for the Bolton show ranged from $65 – $85 while tickets for Gregory Charles were $39-$52.
According to internal emails obtained by the Ottawa Citizen, Bolton was paid a deposit of $41,250,(CDN) half of his contract for the show, while Charles had gotten 50% percent in advance on his $60,000 contract.
A previous show by impressionist Rich Little had also performed well below what organizers had been hoping for, drawing a mere 1,576 people, of which 1,082 had been comped.
The cancellations have sparked local controversy in part because of substantially incorrect public statements which had placed the losses around ten thousand dollars. Doug Moore, manager of Venture Properties, which oversees the operation of Lansdowne Park for the city had stated that the cancellation of the two dates would cost around 10,000 dollars. He has subsequently said that the statements were merely a guess. "I apologize for being wrong in my estimate because I really didn't at the time have any idea because we didn't have any of the reconciliation (statements) for the concerts," said Mr. Moore. – CelebrityAccess Staff Writers
