Broadway hit is set to produce first £50 ticket (if it can find a London stage)

It should have been the biggest treat in London's theatreland for years. The Producers, the hottest ticket on Broadway, is preparing to transfer to the West End.

But now the arrival of the musical comedy, adapted by Mel Brooks from his hit Sixties movie, looks as though it will become a sore point for audiences and actors.

The show, when it arrives, is likely to have the dubious honour of setting a record for high prices. It could usher in the West End's first £50 ticket.

That is, if it ever finds a theatre. Despite its enormous box-office potential, The Producers hasn't got a London home yet. There were reports it would move into the Adelphi. But the theatre's owner, Andrew Lloyd Webber, has no plans to throw out the money-making musical Chicago.

And then there is the worry of who will act in the show.

Few British stars will want to suffer the same humiliation that befell the award-winning actor Henry Goodman when he took over a lead role on Broadway. He was sacked for not getting enough laughs in some performances even before the critics had seen him.

The West End opening of the Tony award-winning show has been confirmed for the autumn of 2003. But it is understood that, when it does open, top-price tickets may be as much as £50, as opposed to the current top-price seats of £42.50 for the Queen musical We Will Rock You.

Terri Paddock, who runs the website Whatsonstage. com, said yesterday: "Going from £42.50 to £50 is quite a hike, and audiences will notice it. It was significant that in New York, when the original cast of Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick left, it was no longer such a hot ticket. So if London producers want to charge £50, they will have to have pretty incredible casting.

"Postings from theatregoers on our website indicate that they were upset by how terribly Henry Goodman was treated on Broadway. To my mind that has soured the whole thing. People expected him to triumph on Broadway and then bring the show over here. That is obviously not going to happen."

The Broadway producers of the show – who include Mel Brooks and the joint heads of the Miramax film company, Bob and Harvey Weinstein – are not making their plans public. But The Stage newspaper, the industry organ in Britain, has revealed that a £50 top price and a transfer to the Adelphi are being considered.

The Society of London Theatre is not opposing the move. It says that as the number of top-price seats has increased, the demand for those tickets by the public has not waned. However, public demand is a complex issue. While theatregoers are keen to have the best seats, they often purchase them at discount prices.

Plays currently being staged in the West End show the trend is growing towards £50 tickets.

For example, Art has ticket prices ranging from £18 to £35. and The Vagina Monologues has tickets from £10 to £30. Chitty Chitty Bang Bang ranges from £15 to £40 and Chicago cost from £15 to £37.50.

The British producer of The Producers, working alongside the Weinsteins and Mel Brooks, will be David Ian, who has recently produced The King And I at the London Palladium. A spokesman for David Ian said: "Neither the theatre nor the ticket prices for The Producers has been decided. Chicago is doing very well at the Adelphi, so that venue is unlikely."

The Producers claims to have won the most Tony awards ever, including Best Musical and and Best Actor in a Musical. It received rave reviews in New York. A critic from The New York Times wrote: "How do you single out highlights in a bonfire?