A very ladylike apology about Gaga site change

TWEETS | ‘I promise to make it up to you,’ after fans express dismay

January 8, 2010

By MARK GUARINO | Chicago Sun-Times

Lady Gaga has this message for her fans: “I promise to make it up to you, you are everything to me.”

That is one of a handful of Tweets the pop singer issued Wednesday after the Sun-Times reported the frustration of fans forced to re-purchase tickets for her three shows at the Rosemont Theatre, which start tonight.

The shows originally were scheduled for the same dates at the Chicago Theatre, but were canceled two weeks ago; fans were notified they had to re-buy tickets without the guarantee they would be in the same location as the purchased seats in the original venue.

Because the official statement from concert promoter Live Nation only specified “production issues” as the reason, speculation fired across the Internet that the venue switch was an attempt to cash in on the singer’s surge in popularity by selling more tickets. The Rosemont Theatre has an additional 900 seats.

Not so, said Marc Geiger, Lady Gaga’s agent and vice president at William Morris Endeavor in Beverly Hills, Calif. “This is more about consumer satisfaction. . . . This only happened because [the Chicago Theatre] did not fit the show.”

Geiger reported that it was Lady Gaga, the persona created by Stefania Germanotta, who wanted her “Monster Ball” tour to play “intimate venues.” The Chicago shows originally were meant for the Aragon, but the dynamics of the historic ballroom’s stage area were considered too limiting to accommodate the 48-foot depth needed for the show.

The show was then booked at the Chicago Theatre, but because of a production mistake the venue’s eight-foot fire curtain was included in the footage estimate; after it was deter- mined the curtain could not be removed to gain needed space, the decision was made to move the show to Rosemont, which was generously built with 60 feet of space to play with, compared with just 40 at the Chicago location.

Chicago was one of several cities that had the same problem, Geiger said. He said even though the Detroit show was moved from the Fox Theatre to the Joe Louis Arena, a difference of about 15,000 seats, the decision was made to cap tickets at 5,500 to keep the production as small as was originally intended.

Geiger said that with Lady Gaga’s rise in popularity, he “could have sold out two United Centers,” but they made the decision to be more conservative. “For an artist on her first album, we want to be fan-friendly, we don’t want to be picked apart,” he said.

Lady Gaga added, via Twitter, that she was “so sick over the 2 venues that were moved” and was “sincerely sorry” to fans who lost seats as a result.