How to get decent priced tickets for shows..

LadyMayBelle

Want to try and get tickets for 'Matilda' for myself and the little sis who is coming to visit in a few weeks ; I can get them straight from the theatre, but I hear about people getting cheaper tickets from god knows where. I'm not in the office for a few days so cant ask colleagues, but does anyone know the best places/sites/times/ways of getting tickets that arent extremely expensive? Havent even actually started looking, but dont want to get caught up searching dozens of sites if someone has a suggestion!

Much obliged

Just saw options to enter promo code on the site too..any tips?

Fysh

Timeout and lastminute.com both have mailing lists they use to push their offers (you can sign up for the timeout one here). Not sure if there's a centralised source for cheap theatre tickets, but hopefully if there is someone will enlighten us soon

Fenny

It all depends on a lot of things, really - what the highest price is you're willing to pay, where you want to sit in the theatre, when you're going and what you're going to see. For a big, new-ish show like Matilda, it will be fairly difficult to find stalls seats for much less than the full price (which is about £65 as far as I know).

There is a TKTS booth in Leicester Square that you can get up to half-price tickets (usually dress/upper circle) on the day of the performance. This is sometimes hit and miss and obviously involves queuing early, but definitely worth trying if you've got the time! I got really good tickets to Hairspray once with it. As mentioned, lastminute.com often do special offers and discounts. You can sometimes get really great seats for £25 from lastminute, but this depends on the show and when you're going. The same goes for most discount websites, really. And in August, London theatres are running Kids Week, which lets any child under 16 go free to certain shows (Matilda is one of them) which might help.

Mostly, though, especially if the show is really popular, I generally just go with upper circle tickets for the lowest price. You're pretty far away from the action, but generally with musicals, I think it's fine - the big epic numbers are still pretty great even if you can't see the actors up close. I also always find Seat Monkey useful to check the view/value of your seat and whether you might be better off going cheaper - not all 50 quid tickets are created equal, sadly.

I've heard Matilda is fantastic, so enjoy! I really want to take my little cousins to it at some point.

LadyMayBelle

Oh brilliant, thanks for the advice; the cheapest of the cheap seats seems to be £25, waaaay at the back row L! Next up is £29.50; still not great seats but I just want to be sure I am not missing out on anything that woudld ensure better seats. There is lot of hearsay.. but Id rather not be hanging around on the day in the hope of getting tickets, because I'd lke to surprise her (she's 11).

Thanks, again, I'm welcoming any promo codes

Feathers

+1 for on the day at Leicester Sq tube station — they're official resellers, afaik. OK, if it's for your sister who's coming over, you might want to be more sure of getting the tickets you want, but you can get great value.

I got front row of the dress circle to Les Mis for £30! Very much helps if you can go mid-week too though.