The Literary Adventures of Claire and Elana, Part 1

The Literary Adventures of Claire and Elana: LiteraryManager.org Edition

ELANA rummages through the fridge at Theatre Bay Area, grabs a paper bag and pulls out her lunch, staring disdainfully at the stale bread and old apple that she packed herself in her sleep-deprived morning haste. Enter CLAIRE, who crosses cheerily to the water cooler to get a drink.

CLAIRE: So, I did it! I submitted a play to the Playwright’s Foundation for the Bay Area Playwright’s Festival.

ELANA: When was the deadline?

CLAIRE: I know, I know, I took my sweet time. Maybe someday I’ll get in a submission one or two days before the very second they are due.

ELANA dons her Judging Cap—a stylish porkpie, complete with feather.

CLAIRE: (sheepishly) I think I heard a quote somewhere that real playwrights wait until the last minute. Have you heard that one?

ELANA: No.

CLAIRE: Oh. Well. This year I didn’t even have to mail in my submission, so I was able to procrastinate more than usual. They're using this new website called LiteraryManager.org. Have you heard of it?

ELANA: Yes.

(Pause.)

CLAIRE: Well, it was great! I just filled out an online form, uploaded my script, and that was that. I didn't have to print or mail anything. Did you submit a play this year?

ELANA: No...

ELANA rotates her Judging Cap to reveal the words “PLAYWRIGHTS FOUNDATION SELECTION COMMITTEE” written on the back. CLAIRE gasps and drops her water.

ELANA: So we meet.

CLAIRE: Well, technically, we’ve known each other for a few months, being coworkers and all.

ELANA: So we meet...as judge and judged.

CLAIRE: I didn’t realize you were on the selection committee!

ELANA: I didn’t realize you submitted a play to the Playwrights Foundation! Wait. Does this not strike you as odd? Two coworkers, standing around the water cooler for an inordinately long time, able to provide complementary views on a new online literary database and seemingly unable to talk about anything else?

(CLAIRE and ELANA make eye contact and slowly, suspiciously cast their eyes skyward, where a giant pencil eraser threatens to poke down from up above.)

CLAIRE: Elana, you’ve resorted to a metatheatrical representation of yourself as the playwright-slash-literary puppetmaster?! Thank god you didn’t submit a play this year, or you would’ve been the laughingstock of the local theatre community!

ELANA: Don’t look at me, I’m not the one pulling the metaphorical strings here!

CLAIRE climbs atop the refrigerator and peers into the left eye of META-ELANA.

CLAIRE: (Scrambling down) OH MY GOD. I can’t believe I’m in a play with a character named “META-ELANA.” Just being a character in this play is going to regress my writing 10 years. OH MY GOD! REGRESS MY WRITING? IS THAT EVEN A PHRASE??

(The giant pencil eraser starts to erase Claire’s left foot.)

ELANA: WAIT, SHE'LL TALK, DON’T ERASE HER!

(The eraser hesitates.)

ELANA: Claire, say something! Say something more about the database!

CLAIRE: Uhm….I totally didn’t feel all angsty about paying the readers fee, because I didn’t have to spend any money on copies or binding or envelopes or postage. Wouldn’t it be great if someday, in the future, this was the way all plays were submitted.

(The eraser starts to erase CLAIRE's right hand.)

ELANA: WAIT! Stop! She's given you what you wanted! She's talking!

CLAIRE: (Louder) Freelance dramaturges can also use it to - --

(The eraser erases CLAIRE's mouth.)

ELANA: NOOOOOO! WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM US?? WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM US, META-ELANA?!?

To be continued...

Will Claire and Elana escape from the water cooler unharmed? Will Claire get her mouth back? And just what *is* this literary database of which Claire and Elana speak so passionately, anyway? These questions and more will be answered in Part 2 of The Literary Adventures of Claire and Elana: LiteraryManager.org Edition.

How to Get the 18-40 Crowd to Put Down the Controller and Go to Your Theatre

This special guest post was written by Impact Theatre artistic director Melissa Hillman. Learn more about Impact Theatre at http://www.impacttheatre.com/

“How do you get so many young people into your theatre? How can we do that?”

I’ve been asked these questions over and over and over. And over. The real answer is: I’m not sure. All I can tell you is what we’ve done, how we’ve done it and what I think you can do to better your chances of attracting the 18-35 audience. Will it work for you? I don’t know. Did it work for us? Yes, indeed.

Bear in mind that you need to do all of these things, all at the same time. This isn’t a pick-and-choose situation.

1. Do the kinds of plays young people want to see.

I am astounded by the fact that some larger theatres seem to believe young people should *always* be willing to translate, and blame self-centeredness, lack of interest in culture, lack of education and general boorishness when the 18-40 crowd don’t turn out in droves for a production of Dinner with Friends or Love Letters. Yet these very same theatres won’t slot a new play by an emerging playwright for fear of their subscribers’ reactions. They expect young people to translate, and heap condemnation upon them when they don’t, but they see older audience members’ potential lack of interest as their due. (P.S. Believe me when I tell you that 65 is the new 35. Many older Bay Area theatergoers are more adventurous than you think. TRUST. Moving on.)

While it’s always a good thing to have an active interest in the stories of people not in your age group (or ethnic group, or regional group, or religious group, etc), everyone longs to see their own stories, hopes, dreams, fears, realities and fantasies reflected in honest ways. Young people are no different. The key phrase here is “in honest ways.” A play by an older playwright with roles for young actors may or may not speak honestly to your desired potential younger audience members. Some older writers write very well for younger characters. Many do not. Large numbers of young people are not going to spring for tickets to a show that portrays them as mindless, boorish assholes. Find plays that speak honestly about the lives of young people in some way.

But how do I do that, Melissa?

I’m so glad you asked.

There are over 400 theatre companies in the nine-county Bay Area. We do more world premiere plays than almost any other region in the country—last I checked we ranked third. Yet it’s very common that staff from theatres who purport to want young audiences don’t come to world premiere productions at small theatre companies. How many emerging playwrights have you read this year? If the number is under 10, you’re slacking. Impact Theatre, my company, has produced a world premiere by, and/or entirely introduced to the Bay Area, these playwrights: Sheila Callaghan, Steve Yockey, Prince Gomolvilas, Enrique Urueta, Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, Liz Meriwether, Lauren Yee, Peter Sinn Nachtrieb, Joshua Conkel, Trevor Allen, Jon Tracy. This is a partial list—I stuck to people you’ve probably heard of. Most importantly, we’re a tiny dog on a very, very big block. There are a wagonload of companies doing precisely what we do. Find them. See their shows. Spy on the playwrights they use. Companies like mine are your R&D department.

Find directors who can make classic plays relevant and interesting—because they are. There are directors all over the country who draw loads of younger audience members into theatres to see Shakespeare, and a bunch of them are directing at these aforementioned smaller theatres.

2. Be realistic about your pricing.

It’s always annoying to hear people say, “But they’ll spend $60 on a concert ticket! Why won’t they spend $60 on theatre?” It’s like wondering why someone would drive all the way across country to be with her beloved but not drive just as long in the hope that she will meet a hot stranger in a bar. People drop bucks on concert tickets because they already know and love the artist and have every expectation of seeing a great show and having a great experience. Condemning those people for refusing to drop a similar amount of money on a show they may know little about that will, let’s be honest, likely bore them because it’s aimed entirely at someone else, is a bit much, yes? If you’re going to condemn the under-40 crowd for not dropping $60 on your play about middle-class, middle-aged white people and their midlife crises, you should also condemn Grandma because she’s not stocking her DVD collection with $60 of Robot Chicken.

So keep your ticket prices accessible. Some companies do an under-30 rate, which, quite frankly, I’m not wild about. That 30-40 crowd is young enough to need enticing into your theatre but old enough to be on the brink of having enough money to become donors and subscribers. You want them. They’re routinely ignored and that’s not going to pay off in the long run for your audience building. Make an under-40 rate if you must. Make some performances pay-what-you-will. Make your less attractive seating areas $20 for the first few weekends. Whatever you need to do, do it.

3. Market to young people.

If you’re not active on Facebook and Twitter, you need to be right now. Learn how to use these powerful tools properly. This isn’t a social media marketing post, so I’ll assume you can figure out where to get this info and move on. The blog on your website is going nowhere unless you’re pushing it with Facebook and Twitter, by the way.

Find ways to make your outreach to young people honest and, most importantly, unpretentious. One of the main things keeping young people out of the theatre is that they’re afraid they won’t fit in—they’ll feel awkward and out of place. As my friend’s dad was fond of saying, they’re afraid they’ll “stand out like a sheep turd in a bowl of cream.” You want to make them as comfortable as possible. A big step towards that is to use your marketing to make them feel welcome. Not pretend welcome, as in, “We want to sell you tickets,” but truly welcome, like “Come over and play with us! We just got a new toy!”

Theatre is not medicine. We don’t go because it’s good for us. We go because we think it’ll be awesome. Make sure you’re approaching your marketing properly. “It’ll be awesome” + “You’re totally welcome and will be comfortable” + “We’re not stuffy and pretentious” will go a long way. Make sure you’re delivering those goods onsite as well. Nothing drives someone away from your company forever as efficiently as an undelivered promise.

And that’s pretty much it. This is what I believe has worked for us over the past 15 years. I hope it’s successful for you as well. We all need to work together to build audiences for our future as an artistic community. There’s not a single one of us that exists on an island. We’re all in this together.

Where Do Original Musicals "Play" in the Bay Area New Play Landscape?

There’s no question that the Bay Area is a hotbed for presenting new plays. Interestingly, the proportion of new musicals produced in the area, seems (to me) surprisingly low. Aside from ACT's upcoming production of Tales of the City and last year's showing of American Idiot at Berkeley Rep, world premiere musicals are few and far between, particularly when it comes to smaller theatres. Recently I have become aware of two world premiere musicals in the area, which I found to be an interesting convergence in happening (if not in theme): As Always by Peter Tucker and Dogs! It's the Musical! by Rose Tobin O'Connor. After speaking with Tucker and Silver Moon Productions artistic director Nellie Cravens, I was able to learn more about each production and shed light on some of the unique challenges of producing a world premiere musical.
Currently in performances through March 27 at the Eureka Theatre, As Always (asalwaystickets.com) traces a psychological journey through love, loss, and redemption during a single night of dreams, where inner battles come to life within the timely allegory of a foreign war. “Dreams have always fascinated me," Tucker says about his inspiration for the piece. "We create a world every night that is an emotional echo chamber from our waking experiences. As both participant and observer in dreams, every image, experience, interaction and character necessarily is born from our subconscious mind. Without the filter of conscious thought while sleeping, our dreams can go places we can't. This dream world has historically been ripe for theatricality, of course, and As Always found it to be a perfect device to tell a story about these themes. Much like we interpret our dreams upon waking through the lens of our own experiences, I also wanted our symbolic and non-literal world to speak to the audience members through their own lenses. After the applause, I hope they glean from the story and music what is most relevant to them and they find their own emotional ethos."
Tucker responded to the challenges of getting a world premiere musical produced by producing the show himself. Though necessary, doing so presented its own unique challenges. "While networking in preparation for the show," he says, "I noticed that theatre companies and industry groups seem to take self-production less seriously than works produced within the established frameworks of even the smallest theatre companies. This stigma exists even though access to those frameworks is difficult. Many producers and writers have been waiting years for a reading or production of their work.”
Silver Moon Productions presents a contrasting example with the world premiere of Dogs! It’s the Musical! at Andrews Hall in the Sonoma Community Center (April 15-May 15; http://silvermoontheatre.org/). The show follows an angel who is sent to earth to learn how to be a dog. Even though the show, which was written in 2004, had an "inside track" to the producers (the author is the sister of the vice president of Silver Moon’s board of directors), the musical was a bit of a tough sell. Nellie Cravens, artistic director of the company, says “We were cautious about producing a new work, especially a musical. Nevertheless, in 2010, we had a read-through/sing-through of Dogs! in Sonoma. We were charmed and excited by its potential. One of our theatre company’s goals is to become a valued part of the Sonoma community. We are always looking for works that will draw a family audience, and at the same time provide an entertaining experience for adults. Dogs! It’s the Musical! moves us toward that goal. We think it has a future, in a variety of possible venues. Audiences of all ages are bound to appreciate songs with titles like “Smell Me and Tell Me” and “Come On and Let Me Lick Your Pants.”
Have you ever been involved in a Bay Area-based original musical?
What Bay Area original musicals have you attended? What are your favorite(s)?

Envisioning Alternatives

Earlier this week, we generated a heated discussion about Rocco Landesman's comments at the New Play Institute on our blog and Facebook page. I walked away from that discussion with the sense that yes, our theatrical ecosystem (from a business standpoint) is unsustainable. Many (sadly, most) theatre artists work for nothing or next to nothing. In spite of this, we are indeed witnessing a rapid increase in the amount of theatre companies springing up around the country, and that increase is concurrent with an alarming decrease in funding sources for these theatre companies. However, as the reaction around the blogosphere is indicating, simply suggesting that we have too many theatre companies without proposing meaningful alternatives to the current system is overly simplistic and frustrating to artists whose life's work is in question.

That's where this post comes in. I would like to set aside this space to envision alternatives to the traditional models that many artists follow as criticized by Landesman: to produce a play or two with friends, to identify a niche in the theatre community, or at least a solid group of artists with whom one wants to continue to work, and then to form a theatre company with said artists. I have noticed a tendency in the theatre community to view creating a new theatre company as a necessary step in legitimizing one's work and building an audience. In our current theatrical environment, this is absolutely true. But can we imagine other systems in which this might not be as much of an issue?

Should established theatre companies, for example, create more opportunities for less established artists to create? What if large companies dedicated a certain amount of resources to smaller-scale "theatre laboratories" in which fringe artists could experiment with the form without having to create an entire theatre infrastructure of their own? How would the large companies benefit from such arrangements?

Could a group of smaller companies pool their resources to establish one umbrella nonprofit coop of sorts that serves all of them (run by a centralized managing director), much as arts organizations will pool their resources to share an office or performance space? Would such a thing even be legally and/or logistically feasible? Would this eliminate enough overhead costs to justify the added logistical headaches?

What sort of infrastructure would need to be in place, do you think, so that artists would no longer need to create organizations to satisfy their artistic impulses?

Supply, Demand and Apple Trees - thoughts on the Landesman speech

This blog post represents my views and my views alone. These thoughts are not meant to be representative of the views of any organization I work for.

NEA Chairman Rocco Landesman dropped a bombshell on the New Play Institute national convening last week in the form of eight words: “We are overbuilt…there are too many theatres.”

I'm sad I wasn't actually there to hear the speech, though the full thing is here. But this statement and its surrounding arguments have sparked a fire across the theatre blogosphere. (Even the New York Times got into the act.)

Essentially, Landesman argues that we are (and have been, for a while) in an era where even as arts funding and arts attendance decrease each year, arts non-profits continue to sprout up all over the country. Here are some samples from a blog he wrote in response to some of the criticism his speech got at Art Works, gathering around the hashtag #SupplyDemand:

“The NEA’s 2008 Survey of Public Participation in the Arts (SPPA)…reports a five percentage point decrease in arts audiences in this country. This is juxtaposed against a 23% increase in not-for-profit arts organizations, and a rate of growth for not-for-profit performing arts organizations, specifically, that was 60% greater than that for the total U.S. population.”

And later:

“I care passionately about the arts in this country, and I believe that they will always play a vital role in who we are as an American people. But in order to get to where we need to be, we are going to have to have some uncomfortable conversations and prepare ourselves for a not-for-profit arts sector of the future that does not necessarily look the way it looks today.”

This whole thing reminds me of the mini-dust-up we had on this blog a while back around a post I wrote on whether art needed to justify its existence. A lot of people got really mad at that idea, using many of the arguments being made back to Landesman about his proposals:

• that art is not commerce, and should not be treated in the same profit/loss, supply/demand way that commercial things are


• that arbitrating value of art is a waste of time, as the value is subjective and can be measured neither by the amount of money a piece of art generates nor by how many people see it


• that the playing field is uneven and grossly favors the largest animals in the forest.

I guess what I see here is what makes the arts world so fascinating and vibrant—the push/pull of aesthetes and economists, of artists and pragmatists (if those two things should be juxtaposed…I know plenty of pragmatic artists, although it’s worth pointing out that many of them are viewed as “sell outs”).

In a conversation yesterday about Landesman’s speech, one person who was there expressed how upset he was about what he saw as a lack of understanding that what Landesman was proposing would essentially rip the rug out from under many artists who have toiled away at this work for decades. Another said that she thought she probably agreed with a lot of what Landesman said, but that his tone was so off-putting she couldn’t be sure. I can understand both points, although from reading what has followed from Landesman, I’m not sure that’s what Landesman meant to convey.

When you strip away the tone, rhetoric and personality associated with the ideas, I find (for myself, here) that I can’t really find flaw in the equation. I think of the apple tree in the backyard of my old apartment building, which sat untended and overgrown. Every year, what seemed like thousands and thousands of blossoms would pop open on the branches, and then all of them would be pollinated and, since we none of us owned the tree, no one would pinch off any of the fruit. The tree, every year, would become burdened by all the fruit—the branches would bend, the leaves would start to look weak, and the fruit itself was small and sallow—a victim of its own ubiquity.

If we as an industry (as we have) have set ourselves up to believe that there’s always room for one more apple on the tree, that the default to success is to create a non-profit theatre company of your very own, then we shouldn’t be surprised that we’re all feeling a little malnourished. In this, of course, we need to lay the blame where it belongs, which is with everyone on every step of the ladder from top-heavy arts organizations that favor known artists over new blood to funders who only fund organizations (and then of a certain size, with a certain pedigree and production history) to, yes, service organizations and other support groups that have for years encouraged unchecked proliferation of organizations and an egalitarian, everyone-deserves-equal-support-regardless attitude.

Might we not, as Landesman seems to be arguing at least in part, all feel a little healthier if we spent some time tending to ourselves? Setting aside for the moment the large, scary questions about what that really means, and setting aside the reality that art is commerce, and needs to function on the same set of rules as anything else (namely that if supply outstrips demand, the correct answer is not to prop up the extra supply) – setting aside all of that, I still have to wonder if we’re best served by the current system, or if perhaps the foundation world (and it’s not just Landesman—former Mellon program officer Diane Ragsdale has written similarly, and Hewlett program officer Ron Ragin has warned of the perils of assuming organizations' permanence) is going to force us to take a long, hard, healthy look at our industry.

Perhaps we’re at an inflection point where “more is better” needs to turn into, as Landesman writes, “we are here to ensure the survival of the most creative and most dynamic.”

Claire's Book Club: The Inciting Incident

I have the same bad habit most book (and theatre) lovers have: I buy more plays than I can actually read. They teeter dangerously on my nightstand and crowd my shelves like rush hour MUNI commuters. Orphaned about my apartment, these scripts stare longingly at me as I ignore them in favor of lesser entertainments. Yet I still thrill at the hunt every time I enter a new or used bookstore. I make a beeline for the drama section and comb the shelves looking for the next play that will inspire or corrupt, enlighten or injure, entertain or enrage. But after a recent trip to the Friends of the Library Book Sale (where I bought literally pounds of new plays), I have decided that enough is enough. I must read what I own.

Why not write about it as I go? Readers, here's the mission: I intend to work my way through the pile of plays on my nightstand (and shelves, and coffee table) to relieve my buyer's guilt and, perhaps, inspire a little critical discussion along the way. Twice a month, I will write reviews of the plays I have read, as a way of keeping myself accountable and exposing you the reader to writers new and old.

The Reading List:
The Shipment by Young Jean Lee, TCG
The Revenger's Tragedy credited to Cyril Tourneur (or Thomas Middleton, depending on what day of the week it is), edited by Lawrence J. Ross, University of Nebraska Press

The Shipment by Young Jean Lee, TCG

"Ever hear the one about the white theater critic and the black identity-politics play by the Korean-American writer?"

- David Cote, writing in the New York Times about The Shipment in 2009.

This play requires five actors. Four male, one female. All African American. The costuming and props are specific and integral to the script. The set for the first half of the show doesn't have to be much more then acting blocks, but the second half requires realism. I would not recommend this play for actors looking for monologues or scene work for classes and auditions unless guided by a coach or teacher. This play is not for the faint of heart--it pushes buttons and experiments with structure and narrative.

The Shipment is the first play by Young Jean Lee I have had the privilege to read. I knew I was going to love it before I even cracked the binding. I fell in love with Lee at first New York Times online review sight. I love a creator with mendacity/audacity/tenacity...and the talent and wisdom to back it up.

The play is really a treatise on the depiction of race in the entertainment industry (and specifically in live theatre). Using clichés and caricatures as her broad strokes, Lee builds her story so the audience is unsure of who the joke is on until the last line. The Shipment contains one of the most powerful endings I've ever read. I can't get it out of my head. The play is often funny, but each punch line is really a set up for the conclusion.

The Revenger's Tragedy by Cyril Tourneur (or Thomas Middleton or someone else...)

Fourteen or more speaking parts. Numerous nobles and judges and rabble. Only three women's roles. There's plenty of opportunity for double casting, but I wouldn't recommend changing the genders of the characters unless there is a specific concept in mind. This is an English language Jacobean tragedy, and can be performed with a unit set and basic props and costuming. Weapons will be needed as the last scene is an utter and all-consuming bloodbath. Good monologues for men, and some really great scenes for two or three actors. The question is: Is it a tragedy, dark with gruesome horrors...or is it a dark comedy, gruesome for its satirical treatment of horror?

Gratiana: No, he was too wise to trust me with his thoughts.
Vindince: I'faith then, father, thou wast wise indeed;
"Wives are but made to go to bed and to feed."

Women suffer page after page of this sort of treatment. When a woman isn't being raped, she’s seducing or killing or worse…whining. There are only whores and virgins in the world of this play, except all the virgins are raped and turned into whores. When a rapist is brought before a judge he says of his crimes: "My fault being sport; let me but die in jest." What a guy.

So, this play was not funny "ha ha." But, the more I read, the more absurd the treatment of women became and I began to wonder at it's purpose. Tourneur seems to be about pushing buttons, not unlike Young Jean Lee. The scenarios are so ridiculous, the plots so confusing, the twists so twisty that I couldn't help but find in these pages true flashes of satiric subversion and a devilish eyebrow cocked toward a bloody patriarchy.

A closing tip for voracious readers:

My favorite place to hunt for new plays is a university book store. If you've ever wanted to break into the reading lists of the best theatre minds in the country, run to the universities where they teach and stand in the bookstore line. San Francisco State University is an excellent resource for new plays. Yes, I order plays from Samuel French, TCG and Amazon, but for those days when I just want to browse and don’t want to be once again disappointed by a Borders or some other big chain, the SFSU Bookstore is a great place to go.

So…what are you reading?