The Netherlands largest musical producer Joop van den Ende announced that musical audiences will have doubled in five years time.

In 1995, 740,000 people saw a musical produced by Joop van den Ende, which that year included The Phantom of the Opera, My Fair Lady and Evita. In 1996 when the musical Miss Saigon opened and West Side Story started it's tour, the audience increased to 820,000, whilst in 1997 the audiences for a Joop van den Ende produced musical reached 1,070,000, with the original musical Joe, de musical and the revival production of De Jantjes. For 1998 Joop van den Ende expects 1.2 million people to see one of the musical produced by him, which will include the musicals Chicago, Blood Brothers and Anatevka. A further increase is expected in 1999. This will mean that aproximately 10 percent of the entire Dutch population will have seen a musical produced by Joop van den Ende.

Joop van den Ende is the largest musical producer in The Netherlands but not the only one. Other musicals currently touring The Netherlands are The Sound of Music, Annie, Grease and Larry, This Funny Valentine, based on the life of Lorenz Hart.

Joop van den Ende has also announced other musicals for the coming seasons, to include the Broadway hit musicals Titanic, which was co-produced by Joop van den Ende in New York, Bring in da noise, bring in da funk, Rent and Fame. No firm dates have been given for these productions to come to Holland.

Also, a new musical is being considered based on D.H. Lawrence novel Lady Chatterly's Lover. A creative team led by director Eddy Habbema and including writer Edwin de Jongh is studying the project. --By Maxim Bezembinder
Netherlands/Belgium Correspondent