Opera Australia‘s financial woes have continued, after posting a $10 million operating deficit. It also confirmed its Sydney Winter season of Sunset Boulevard failed to meet box office expectations. Chair Rod Sims defended the shortfall by pointing to various factors that have led to the company’s worst financial results since the pandemic.
Sims is optimistic, pointing to improved ticket sales for its Summer season. “Our 2025 financial result will be much closer to break-even, and we are well into the year. Indeed, our revenue from our Sydney summer opera was the best recorded,” he says in a media statement released earlier today to accompany the company’s 2024 Annual Report.
“With disciplined execution and the continued support of patrons, partners and audiences, I am confident that this challenging chapter for Opera Australia will ultimately strengthen our company, its approach to excellence, and our ability to continue to support the Australian opera ecosystem,” Sims adds.
Nonetheless, the operating loss adds to the overall impression of a challenging year for Opera Australia, the country’s national opera company, over the last 12 months.
Artistic Director Jo Davies resigned abruptly last year and CEO Fiona Allan subsequently stepped down in early 2025, having only joined the company in 2021.
The Opera Australia Board is currently processing the results of an independent review into the company’s culture and staff morale.
In 2024, Opera Australia saw a $15 million drop in box office revenue and a $1.8 million drop in philanthropy and donations.
The company’s recent commercial musical, Hadestown, which is currently playing at Melbourne’s Her Majesty’s Theatre, was described as ‘lacklustre, undercooked’ by ArtsHub‘s Rita Bratovich during its earlier Sydney season.
Read: Musical review: Hadestown, Theatre Royal Sydney
Sims says, “Opera Australia is fully engaged in the execution of strategies aimed at enhancing its ongoing financial sustainability and recouping losses accumulated over recent years.
“Paramount to this is a focus on commercially sustainable programming, considering the balance of commercial and artistic outcomes in its annual program in a way that both excites audiences and delivers sound financial returns. The company is also focused on cost control, including a recent procurement review.”
ArtsHub expects that the company’s latest losses will – and certainly should – result in significant changes to Opera Australia’s current Board.
The company is currently in the process of recruiting a new CEO, and instead of a new Artistic Director, a Director of Opera, and Music Director.
According to Opera Australia’s media release, ‘these processes are well advanced’ and the new leadership structure ‘is in place in other global opera companies and is one OA has relied on in the past, positioning the company well for necessary renewal as it prepares for its 70th anniversary in 2026’.
