Well hello again.
The noggin's been thinking and doing a lot of reading lately, and sadly not a whole lot of time to jot down notes. (Now writing down that I need to write down notes)... OK. Here's what stuck out.
-Yesterday:
Another early, but kindly short day on tour. It felt like I blinked and we were back. Once we returned, I got right on task. There were some errands (that had been delicately placed at the front of that post-it wall mentioned earlier) I needed to do. I had drop off some new submissions for Summer and Fall work. There were a few plays I needed to pick up for reading and crafting work on potential monologues. There were also submissions for the play festival have been coming in and I grabbed myself a packet to start reviewing (more on this later). I even had time to chat to some of the kindly administration folks. Ah, the feeling of getting things done. Golden.
But perhaps the most intriguing experience of the day was just around the hourly bend...
Word had got to me that afternoon about a company meeting that would be in session. So, I got myself all dressed up for the Box Office, that would happen directly after, and joined the theatrical throng. In summary: the theater is doing well. It's a record season for attendance with over 20,000 subscribers (yeah, that's a lot) with each show being extended at least once (these shows are averaging 6-8 week runs). So, cool. People coming to see theater is always great news. What especially caught my ears was the conversation we had about where the future of theater is going. Our theater's mission is to make good theater and make it affordable. Sounds obvious enough doesn't it? Well, getting a good product and being able to afford the price you put on it are far from easy. A lot of my peers reading this don't need a reminder on how labor and material intensive a good show can be. I don't even want to THINK about what utilities cost. Again, another interesting article in the economics of theater might need to be posted. (Putting into my notes...).
But the point that was being made here is that often there are very particular demographics that can attend--and really we mean afford--to come see live theater. Broadway's great. Broadway ticket prices are downright scary. With the current state of everyone's' wallets these days, that can become even more of a concern. How do theaters find affordable programming that can start to speak to, say, my generation, or a group of kids, or another under-represented group, while not alienating the super-important contributors that have been loyal to the cause for years...? It's quite a quandary. And many theaters haven't found the answer. And such have since closed their doors for good or really scaled down their efforts--in many case, both types trying to come out from huge debts incurred while making the improvements they thought were going to bring in more patron dollars. I'm going to have to get into this more at a later time when more research time is available. It's a really important discussion. Make sure to contact your lawmakers right now, because the government is already slated to cut back national support. And, it could get worse if the House has its way.
-Today:
The last three days we've been road-trippin' in and around the town of Arcadia. Today was another solid show. I ended up being a big, hairy, junkyard monster that was beaten into a fuzzy pulp by a very brave girl who got lost in the junk piles while trying to build herself an automobile from scratch. We had an epic fight over whether or not I would let her pass. And of course I was going to win...
Round 1: She manhandled me. I was tossed all over the place and flattened into the earth.
Round 2: I threw her around a little; thought I had her figured out. But then, she came back with a fury. Once again I was a hairy puddle being made one with the dirt by what interestingly turned into increasingly smaller objects (I think the last one was a gear for the car she was building). I guess my monster head was too hard for just one beating.
In the class I taught, we were busy writing stories about everything from World War II to castles to candy. What excited me today is we were able to get writing very quickly with a big class. Always good news. And that's about all the mental RAMs got going on the brain right now. Tomorrow, we'll get back to our regularly scheduled tour.
By the way...two performance days left for Playmakers (whoa).
-Ben
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