377 days, Blog #167 or an attempt to unravel my latest theater pet peeve (I fail to do so by the way)

Okay, artsy friends.  Bear with me here.  I’m about to go into a territory that you immediately don’t think you can understand… or more plainly, want to.

Numbers.

I spent a lot of time last fall making a chart (well I spend a lot of my time making charts) about the season schedules of theaters in central Massachusetts.  I found a curious list of patterns.  Like every theater – no matter how many shows they do a season – typically performs something in November or December.  And yet, even with this obvious staring us in the face, we keep on booking (the same) shows for that slot.  Well most of us do anyway.  But even if it isn’t November or December, it does affect September and October in terms of talent pools.  And audience pool.

Whatever.  Who cares about that stuff?  I just want to do my show.  I just want to get to do the theater that I want to do.  And if the big bad board/bored members say no way, well I’ll just go out and do it on my own.  Yeah, I’ve had that thought.  I still have that thought.  In fact, that’s why I’m looking at the numbers.  But I’m going to give away some of my conclusions.

Or one.

We are cannibalizing ourselves.

I put this analysis under a rock – well, more like a folder in my home office file cabinet.  To, I don’t know, retrieve when I might discover someone who actually cares about this stuff.  But this week, I found it trickling through my brain again.  I was looking at some recent invites to see shows of friends.  I want to see more than I do.  In theory.  Mostly, I really like going back to my sanctuary in the woods on the weekend evenings, light a fire, make a cup of tea and plug away on the brain dump of my first draft.  But after just completing a show, I remember how priceless the appearance of any friend, near and dear or distant acquaintance, in the audience is.  The validation of what you do, of who you are as an artist, and the art itself is so meaningful.  That, and well, the income that totally justifies the fact a board/bored put enough trust in you to use the building and its resources for a few weeks.  But it all comes together with an appreciation I have really come to know from writing – that someone is willing to PAY for something I create.  Which actually brings me back to where I meant to go with this paragraph.  Paying for our mutual art.  

It’s a worthy investment.  I spend my life analyzing costs of things –indeed the costs of artistic things.  I also know how to spot the fat and waste pretty quick.  Battles I don’t want to pick – or maybe I do (cough, cough plastic flowers).  I get overhead.  Legitimate rental, material, and (for a generous minority) staffing costs.  I don’t know, however, if I get why we are letting theater get to be so expensive.

I don’t count exactly, but I notice that a number of theaters are creeping towards the $20 per ticket cost, if not surpass it.  I don’t like that.  

Because, you figure you spend $20 for a ticket.  Then you spend another (at least) $20 to go out with friends after.  If you have to pay for parking or get another drink – that is $50.  Which, yes, I will do for friends.  But it forces me to pick what friends I can support.  Because do that twice in a weekend, that is $100.  Do it every weekend, it could be hundreds of dollars a month.  Not everyone wants to spend that kind of money - or can.  So... not only are we conflicting with our fellow theaters through our schedule, but also by stealing money from our audience's budget.

Except… I get it.  Sort of.

Sort of.

It’s been a while since I’ve been to a sold out community theater show.  Granted, I don’t go to a lot of musicals.  I know that’s often an easy seat filler.  Except… not always.  Especially when you look at that chart I did and see how many people do musicals in the spring or summer or fall.  Winter is really the only time there isn’t a proliferation of song and dance.  But there are a lot of rich offerings that aren’t musicals.  We actually have quite a few theaters here in Central Mass.  I have 23 in my chart – and those are just the ones with consistent seasons (or a decent website – but I won’t even go there … right now).  There are all sorts of little theater companies popping up here and there.  And that’s great.  I mean, you can see Shakespeare.  Or Neil Simon.  Or something new.  Or even something edgier than you might typically see.   No Pinter yet.  And people are still weirdly prejudiced about the bard.  But my point is you can probably find something to suit your fancy every month of the year.  Sometimes in duplicate (seriously, how many Massachusetts theaters are doing Other Desert Cities in May?).

I like seeing people try new things or old things in a new way.  I love being able to be a part of it both on and off the stage.  I love doing the art I have loved since I was young enough to not remember loving it.

But who are we doing it for?

Credit Andrew Jackson via Flickr Creative Commons

I have yet to collect numbers to validate my hypothesis, but mere observation will indicate that most audiences are half fellow theater people.  Some of this crosses over with the other sure bet of friends and family of the cast, but it basically means we are pulling audience from the same source.  This has a lot of merits.  Like a guarantee there will be someone in the audience.  We see our friends.  Easy cultivation for other shows.  Maybe they are the ones who want to avoid seeing the farce that has been done nine gazillion times and will go down the dark and dirty rabbit hole of Pinter.  But still.  That’s maybe ten people.  Or if you have a larger cast, you could score a 40 some in your audience to buy $20 tickets so the show breaks even or gets close to it.

That’s a pretty big burden to put on those theater people/friends, isn’t it?  Because they are the ones that show up, they are the ones who have to pay more to account for the ones who don’t.  But as long as enough of them do, it’s okay to do the plays (that I would rather see by the way) that aren’t Neil Simon or Annie (the plays non-theater people want to see).  In other words – and what I’ve taken way too long to get to – we are making our friends foot the bill for our passion projects.

I don’t know if I’m okay with that.

I don’t know if I’m not okay with that.

Mostly, I would like to talk about this with my fellow theater people and friends.  And I will.  But I’ve decided this brain dump needed to happen first to help me find a better way to express my argument question.  I don’t know that I’m doing too well right here, right now.  But maybe it will provoke a comment or two.

It’s really important to support art.  

It’s unfair, I think, to expect it of our friends.  All the time.  Or without the humility of a request/gratitude/acknowledgment of what you are asking.

What’s the alternative then?  Well, that’s what I’m trying to figure out.  Is it better to charge more so you don’t lose everything on a show that will only attract 30 people a performance?  Or take a gamble and charge a little bit less in the hopes of doubling the audience?  But where does that audience come from … especially if we are already asking those same people to come to show after show after show?  It takes a lot of work to convince non-theater people that coming to some show they’ve never heard of is worth giving up an evening at home or doing something else that doesn’t cost $20.  And who has time for that convincing?  I didn’t have time or the necessary brain matter for it when I directed.  I was too busy directing.  As are a lot of theaters and production staff.

But if we can’t attract the audiences, are we doing the right sort of theater?  No, let me backtrack.  Are we doing the theater we want to do in the most, hm, what’s the word I want to say?  Efficient seems antithetical to anything artistic.  Are we putting into practice method, location, planning, and consideration that will yield the most beneficial/ spectacular result?  Probably not always.  Miraculously sometimes it does happen without thought of any of that.  And maybe there are times when it does have to trip up and fail… because that is how we learn.

Except… are we learning if all we do is go start another theater so we have to slice that pie even thinner?  Is it learning if it is only about the bottom line?  Is forcing oneself to be financially responsible an opportunity for greater creativity or for diminishing it?

I don’t have any answers.  

I will still go theater and support my friends.  And support theater.  I want to do that.  But I also want to see full houses and broader audiences.  I've only begun to contemplate this.  I may change my mind again.  But for now, I think I've occupied your and my time aplenty.