Reading: #124: Pivoting In The Pandemic From Broadway To Broadband (Margaret Skoglund)

When Broadway shut down on March 12, 2020, Margaret Skoglund was on the cusp of realizing her dream — of becoming a Broadway general manager. She’d already handled big shows from Mamma Mia! to The Lion King. “There are 41 disparate theaters on Broadway,” she tells CoveyClub founder, Lesley Jane Seymour. “There is no NFL, no MLB organization to mobilize all of us. There is a trade organization but no headquarters… I thought, ‘we’re not going to figure out how to get back into the theater any time soon’. People thought July… I decided it would be a year.” So Skoglund and a co-founder got busy, setting up a company called Virtual Broadway which “connects dancers, actors, music directors to corporate America.” She started by knocking on the doors of her college alumnae and asking: “Do you need a Hamilton actor to come teach motivational tips?” Turns out they did. A multinational financial firm celebrated their sales team with 45 minutes of specially designed online content. A group of attorneys were led in a stress-relieving wellness activity from actors in The Lion King. “The most fun is putting artists together who get to work at a moment that is devastating,” says Skoglund.