Critical Role’s CEO Travis Willingham sees an opportunity to expand the number of live shows in the US—and maybe other countries—with the success of not only their own shows in London and Los Angeles but also Dimension 20‘s at Madison Square Garden.
The numbers indicate a clear desire for this format of Dungeons and Dragons campaign. Critical Role has been doing live shows at conventions and in smaller theaters such as The Greek Theatre in Los Angeles, but the London show at the Wembley Arena sold out and gathered more than 12,500 fans according to Business Insider, while Dimension 20 sold out their show at the 19,500-seat capacity Madison Square Garden.
In an interview with Polygon, Willingham said they want to make more live shows across the country since they have only performed in Los Angeles, but “we have got to get out of the U.S. a little bit.” He didn’t confirm any international events but brought up some possible countries.
“Can we go to Australia? Can we go to other targets in the EU? Can we go to South America? South America has been amazing in terms of our audience demographic, and we feel like it’s underserved,” said Willingham.
There is a logistical problem when taking the live show to another country, considering the transportation of equipment, staff, props, wardrobe, and the bureaucratic part of visas and international travel. Still, Critical Role’s CEO is used to a challenge. “There’s really no playbook for these things,” he said. “But no playbook [has] kind of [been] our MO for the last five or six years since we went independent.”
Critical Role already reached millions of views on YouTubem, with their latest episode gathering more than 10,000 views in less than 24 hours. With the London live show numbers to back up the online data, Critical Role’s live shows could be going international soon. “We just kind of act on where we think people are wanting or indicating to us that they want to see us,” said Willingham.
For now, Critical Role has events booked until August at the Florida Supercon on July 13, at Gen Con on Aug. 1, and at Anime NYC on Aug. 24. You can get more information about these events on their official website.
