I wish I could say I love this place. It's everything I presumably like: publicly-funded, donates to non-profits, designed by a famous architect, and hosts all the Broadway shows I love.
Yeah, but I can't say that. ASU is one of the biggest universities in the world and tuition isn't cheap (I would know, I owe them 15K). The tickets aren't cheap, and you can expect to pay over $100 a head for even a balcony seat. So you'd think they'd have the money to make this place nice on the inside, right?
Uh, no.
The walls look like they haven't been repainted since the '70s and they banned indoor smoking. The whole place smells kind of like old people funk. The central air conditioning is terrible. You're basically in sweat city within twenty minutes of any show. I know you're supposed to dress up for nice Broadway shows, but I think I would be more comfortable naked with how hot this place gets.
Parking is an absolute nightmare. The actual lot for the venue fills up over two hours before a show. You're left with a poorly-designed structure that is about a block away, that also fills up an hour before the show (and takes over an hour to get out of afterwards). Then you can presumably park elsewhere and take a bus. I don't know for sure, because with a partially-handicapped mother, no way I'm risking that. So I always show up 90 minutes early.
The seats are tiny. I've sat next to people that were just a bit overweight and had half their butt in my lap. I'm pretty sure that airlines have bigger seats.
And here's the absolute worst -- there's no bathrooms. Well, there's maybe 50 total stalls for both genders, combined, in the whole place. Might as well be no bathrooms, because you're sure as hell not using them if you don't want to miss half an hour of whatever you paid $100 to see. If you do need to use them, good luck queueing. There's no place to queue for their absurdly tiny bathrooms.
So show up ninety minutes early in 100F, go in sit in a sweaty old theater in tiny seats and sweat your butt off after paying $12 for a drink, go and sweat in a crowded queue for the bathroom during intermission, and miss half of the second act for your troubles. Then you can go take a sweaty walk to your car a block away, sit in it for a sweat hour while the tiny garage slowly clears out on tiny two-lane streets, and go home and brag about spending $200+ for two seats to an actual Broadway touring show.
If anyone else, and I do mean absolutely anyone else, had touring Broadway shows, I'd be first in line to chuck my money at them. Because this place has seen better days... thirty years ago.