Methuen Drama/Bloomsbury Publishing has announced the publication of Power and Greed: Monopolies, Mergers, and Cartels on the American Stage by Spencer Weber Waller, to be released on October 15, 2026.
At a moment when the economics of live entertainment are under growing scrutiny, Power and Greed arrives as a major new work exploring how concentrated power has shaped the American theatre industry for more than a century. Drawing on extensive archival research and written with a clear eye toward the present, the book reveals how monopolies, mergers, and powerful booking alliances controlled what reached the stage, who got booked, where productions played, how tickets were priced, and who ultimately profited.
Long before today’s debates over consolidation, dynamic pricing, and consumer access, the battle for control of the American stage was already underway. In Power and Greed, Waller traces the rise of the Theatrical Syndicate, the Shubert Brothers, the Vaudeville Combine, and other dominant forces that transformed theatre into a business defined as much by gatekeeping and leverage as by artistry and ambition. Their influence extended far beyond Broadway, shaping the touring circuit and determining what audiences across North America were able to see.
By placing today’s anxieties about live entertainment within a longer historical arc, Power and Greed offers a strikingly timely account of the systems that continue to shape the field. Recent controversy surrounding Live Nation/Ticketmaster and the 2023 Taylor Swift Eras Tour rollout renewed national attention on market consolidation, pricing, and consumer frustration. Waller’s book shows that these tensions are not new, but part of a much longer story about power, access, and control in the entertainment industry.
Part theatre history, part business history, and part legal drama, Power and Greed tells the story of the real struggle behind the curtain: who had the power to produce, present, book, and profit from live performance in America — and what it took for the law to finally begin catching up. The result is a deeply researched and highly relevant new book for anyone interested in Broadway, touring, theatrical production, antitrust law, or the future of live entertainment.
“In show business (it’s been said) you can’t make a living, but you can make a killing. In Power and Greed, Spencer Waller draws on his dual background as an antitrust expert and former federal prosecutor to deliver a fascinating, eye-opening, occasionally startling account of the many ways that cartels and corporations have tried to grab that loot for themselves, and the tools that artists and audiences have wielded to fight back. With its high stakes, larger-than-life characters, and episodes of gleeful criminality, this book is as dramatic as the plays that it describes. It’s an essential read for understanding the big business of American entertainment—both how we got here and where we might go next.” Jeremy McCarter, co-author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Hamilton: The Revolution
Image courtesy of Methuen Drama/Bloomsbury Publishing
