The development of musical theatre in china is still in its initial stage, only a few big theatres have the ability of operating musical performance, and at this time, musical theatre is only performed in few big cities in China, like Shanghai and Beijing. The the-sis focuses on the development of musical theatre in Shanghai. As an entertainment ac-tivity and also one of the performing arts, the demand for musical theatre could be affect by many factors like educational background, income and competition from other forms of entertainment activities. There were many previous studies about the performing arts which also focused on the factors like education and income, however, the level of con-tributions of these factors to the development of different forms of performing arts are different. By reviewing related previous literatures and analyzing the data collected from Shanghai Grand Theatre which bases on a meta analysis of previous studies of performing arts, the thesis explores the current situation of the development of the mus-ical performance in Shanghai and studies various factors that affect the demand for musical theatre, as a result, a deeper understanding of how factors like educational background, income, competition among forms of entertainment activities etc. affect the development of musical theatre in Shanghai wish to be provided.