Controversial Bodies outdrew Titanic show

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This article was published 10/08/2011 (5542 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition didn’t issue as many boarding passes as True North Sports & Entertainment expected, but the company will still salvage a profit from the shipwreck show.

“It’s going to turn a modest profit,” Kevin Donnelly of True North said Monday as accounts were being settled for the touring show, presented at the temporary MTS Centre Exhibition Hall located across Portage Avenue from the hockey arena. “I’m quite satisfied with it.”

Despite having a longer run than the preceding human-cadaver show Bodies. . . The Exhibition, which drew 100,000 ticket-buyers (versus the 200,000 True North originally projected), the much-advertised Titanic attracted about 87,000. It closed July 31.

Donnelly said he had expected the universally recognized Titanic “brand” to out-perform Bodies, which stirred controversy because the U.S.-based producer did not have the deceased’s permission to display the corpses.

“It was kind of surprising that the one with the greater controversy drew the greater crowd, but by no means were we disappointed with the numbers for Titanic,” he said.

The third and final show to play the exhibition hall before it’s demolished for new development will be Da Vinci — The Genius. It opens Aug. 19 and is slated to close Oct. 23. It might be extended by one week, but can’t stretch beyond that, Donnelly said.

Now that Winnipeg is on the radar for exhibition producers, True North is being approached with shows, Donnelly said. For instance, “Da Vinci comes from an Australian company. . . . They came to us. We’re getting approached by exhibitions that I had no knowledge of.”

Donnelly has heard about shows on subjects such as sharks, NASA, the Harry Potter universe and the Narnia series. Since Winnipeg lacks a science centre and the Manitoba Museum doesn’t have the space or mandate to bring in most shows, it’s a business True North may stay in.

“It’s absolutely something I want to keep my eye on,” Donnelly said. “It comes down to location. Can we find another spot that’s equally available, for us to jump back in? It may not be in the next 12 months.”

Da Vinci — The Genius features 65 full-scale inventions based on the Italian artist’s notebooks, such as a glider, helicopter, tank and automobile. One section, Secrets of Mona Lisa, shows how technology has been used to uncover the hidden history of the world-famous da Vinci painting.

Donnelly said he’s a bit worried some Winnipeggers may think the actual priceless masterpiece is leaving Paris and coming to town.

“(The Mona Lisa) is not coming here, and likely will never, ever, ever leave the Louvre,” he cautioned with a chuckle.

alison.mayes@freepress.mb.ca