Mother Teresa on Theatre

Who was it who recently wrote on their blog that they were reading Anne Bogart's And Then, You Act?


I can't find the blogger to thank them. For some reason, when I read their post, I could sense that I needed to read this book. I ordered it right away -- and I had just received in my inbox a 40% off coupon for Barnes and Noble if I used a Mastercard to order. The stars were in alignment.

Tonight, I just want to share the following from Bogart's chapter on "Intention":

"My friend Morgan Jenness admired Mother Teresa, now Blessed Mother Teresa, and at difficult personal junctures, the mere thought of her provided inspiration. Although now a playwright's agent, Morgan worked for many years with the legendary producer Joseph Papp at the New York Shakespeare Festival in New York City. One day, feeling especially depressed about her sesne of uselessness in the world, Morgan heard that Mother Teresa would be in Manhattan. She dropped everything and headed to the Indian Embassy in the hope that she might appear. Standing outside the embassy, Mother Teresa did emerge, surrounded by an entourage, and Morgan managed to capture her attention. She stopped, turned, looked at Morgan right in the eyes and asked, 'What can I do for you?' In the midst of her surprise and awe, Morgan described her work in the theatreand how she had lost all her will as she did not see any usefulness in it and then and there declared her determination to go to India and be of use. Mother Teresa spoke sternly, 'There are many famines. In my country there is a famine of the body. In your country there is a famine of the spirit. And that is what you must feed."

Wow.

Have you ever noticed how the really great people in the world are able to listen, and then compress into a very few words something deeply insightful? Distilled.

Anyway, that story just spoke to something deep within me. When I teach, and when I create a production, my highest wish is to feed a starving spirit. At least one.

Tom Loughlin: One New Play

Like me, Tom Loughlin at "A Poor Player" has been silent for a while, but he comes roaring back with a practical proposal for college theatre departments across America: a "One New Play Campaign." He writes (and read the whole thing here):

I think it’s simple: every theatre department in the country should commit one of their production slots a year to the production of one new play. Ideally, that play should be regional in nature, featuring the work of a playwright from within the region. But I would not make that a requirement. All that matters is that one new play a year gets done on every college campus each year. It can be either a student-produced play or a department-produced play. It can be the work of a student in the department (!) or the work of an outside playwright. Any work that remains unpublished (i.e. not available through Sam French or Dramatists or Baker’s Plays or any other publishing outlet for royalties) would qualify.

This is a great idea, Tom, one I'd like to take a step further. I propose that theatre departments not only do a new play, but also create a course in their curriculum that includes the reading and discussing of at least one new play (preferably a lot more). Don't stop that theatre history course at Angels in America -- what's happening today? In a previous post, I suggested what might be called a "contemporary drama" course that would involve reading whatever plays are published in American Theatre that year (and also reading the articles in that magazine) and a group of unpublished plays by contemporary playwrights who would be willing to talk to the students about their plays, either via email, a blog, a conference call, whatever.

I am willing to create such a course. If you are a playwright who would be willing to have one of your plays included in the reading list, and would be willing to discuss it with the students, email me at walt828@gmail.com. I'm on sabbatical this semester, so my course load when I return in the fall may be filled with catchup courses, but I will endeavor to get this set up as soon as I can.

FYI: List of LORT Theatres

1 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre A Contemporary Theatre (ACT)
2 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Actors Theatre of Louisville
3 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Alabama Shakespeare Festival
4 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Alley Theatre
5 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Alliance Theatre
6 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre American Conservatory Theater
7 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre American Repertory Theatre
8 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Arden Theatre Company
9 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Arena Stage
10 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Arizona Theatre Company
11 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Arkansas Repertory Theatre
12 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Asolo Repertory Theatre
13 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Berkeley Repertory Theatre
14 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Berkshire Theatre Festival
15 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre California Shakespeare Theater
16 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Capital Repertory Theatre
17 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Center Theatre Group
18 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre CENTERSTAGE
19 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre City Theatre Company
20 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Clarence Brown Theatre at the University of TN

21 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The Cleveland Play House
22 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Court Theatre
23 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Dallas Theater Center
24 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Delaware Theatre Company
25 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Denver Center Theatre Company
26 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Florida Stage
27 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Ford's Theatre
28 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre GALA Hispanic Theatre
29 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The Geffen Playhouse
30 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre George Street Playhouse
31 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Georgia Shakespeare
32 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Geva Theatre Center
33 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Goodman Theatre
34 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Great Lakes Theater Festival
35 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Guthrie Theater
36 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Hartford Stage
37 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Huntington Theatre Company
38 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Indiana Repertory Theatre
39 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Intiman Theatre
40 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Kansas City Repertory Theatre

41 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre La Jolla Playhouse
42 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Laguna Playhouse
43 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Lincoln Center Theater
44 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Long Wharf Theatre
45 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Maltz Jupiter Theatre
46 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre McCarter Theatre Center
47 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Merrimack Repertory Theatre
48 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Milwaukee Repertory Theater
49 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Northlight Theatre
50 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The Old Globe
51 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Pasadena Playhouse
52 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The People's Light & Theatre Company
53 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Philadelphia Theatre Company
54 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Pittsburgh Public Theater
55 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre PlayMakers Repertory Company
56 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Portland Center Stage
57 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Portland Stage Company
58 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis
59 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Round House Theatre
60 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Roundabout Theatre Company

61 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre San Jose Repertory Theatre
62 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Seattle Repertory Theatre
63 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Second Stage Theatre
64 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Shakespeare Theatre Company
65 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre South Coast Repertory
66 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Syracuse Stage
67 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Theatre for a New Audience
68 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre TheatreWorks
69 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Traveling Jewish Theatre
70 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Trinity Repertory Company
71 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Virginia Stage Company
72 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre The Wilma Theater
73 (2006-2007 Season)	LORT Member Yes Theatre Yale Repertory Theatre

Excellent Blog

Check out Adam Thurman's "The Mission Paradox." Adam writes about arts marketing, and has a lot of good stuff.

Trust

So as we see from the previous two posts, the health of the American theatre depends on the production of new plays by American playwrights, and the American regional theatres have almost completely abandoned any sense that doing so is part of their job as non-profit organizations supposedly serving the public good. The next question is why.

Why has America's regional theatres resorted to an almost total reliance on "classics"? I'm certain that many artistic directors will argue that the American theatre audience is conservative and doesn't want to see new plays. Like Noah Smith, they point to symphony orchestras and opera companies as being in a similar situation. But can this fear of the new really be true? Americans flock to see new movies and, in fact, are generally distrustful of remakes; they buy tons of new music and, indeed, regard cover bands as lower musical life form; yes, Americans watch re-runs on TV, but not to the exclusion of new shows, or else why would the writer's strike be a problem at all? No, the American psyche has long been focused on the new. So why not new theatre?

A large part of the problem may be the result of our educational system, which puts a major emphasis on plays of the past. Theatre history courses are required for every major, but how many courses are devoted to reading new plays? Perhaps a course devoted to reading the plays published in American Theatre magazine combined with an equal number drawn from a slush pile of new, unproduced scripts would give students a stronger idea of how the theatre fits into contemporary life. Instead, actors and directors go into the field carrying their theatre history anthologies and little else -- is it any wonder we have so many productions of The Seagull? Is it any wonder that most young artists have no idea how to even locate a new play to read, much less produce? Is it any wonder that the most young artists have no idea that a playwright might actually be a live human being who could attend rehearsals and be part of the artistic process? No, we college professors have to carry a great deal of the blame for the lack of new plays being produced by theatre artists.

But that's only half of the equation. I also think we should look at movies, TV, and music and ask: why are audience members willing to lay out their hard-earned money for new stuff? I'd propose that part of it -- and I'd say a big part -- is trust. We buy the latest album by our favorite band because, well, they're our favorite band and we want to see what they are up to now. (And in fact we would feel betrayed if we bought their new album and it was simply remixes of their previous songs and nothing new -- even greatest hits albums usually contain a new cut or two.) We go to certain movies because an actor we like is in it, or it is directed by someone whose movies we have liked in the past, or it is written by a screenwriter whose work we've enjoyed. We've established an ongoing relationship with these people. We trust them.

And it seems to me that what is missing in the American theatre is the trust that results from an ongoing relationship. What would have happened if the second Beatles album was performed by four different musicians than John, Paul, George, and Ringo? Would it have been a hit? Doubtful. Fans would have been outraged. The Beatles ARE John, Paul, George, and Ringo. But our regional theatres rotate actors and directors on almost a show-by-show basis, short-circuiting any possibility of an ongoing relationship between audience and stage. If John, Paul, George, and Ringo ARE the Beatles, who IS the Guthrie? It changes from show to show. Sure, there is an Artistic Director, and sometimes he or she has actually been around more than a year or two, but Artistic Directors are directing fewer and fewer of the productions because they have administrative functions. Instead, each individual production imports a director from somewhere else, and he or she does that single show and is never heard from again. The same is true of playwrights -- are there any regional theatres who have a resident playwright whose work is produced regularly? Perhaps a few, where a playwright has formed a relationship with a specific director, but it is rare.

We theatre people see this as a fact of life, and in fact we see it as a good thing -- we think it is a benefit to cast the "best" actor for each role, rather than maintaining a company where we have to put up with an actor playing a role for which he or she may be less than ideal. But the audience sees it differently -- they like seeing an artist stretch and try something new; they like having an ongoing relationship with an actor, a director. A theatre's identity is in its artists, not in its address. How can we expect audiences to make a leap into the unknown without having established a trusting relationship with SOMEBODY at the theatre?

If we want audiences to support new plays, we need to build an ongoing relationship of trust with them. The revolving door that is American regional theatre has got to stop.

Fear of New Plays

Yesterday, I discussed why a commitment to the production of new plays was important to the health of the American theatre. I quoted regional theatre pioneer Margo Jones, who wrote in 1951 that America's regional theatres needed to assume a "violent" commitment to the production of new plays if the American theatre was going to progress. "We must have our new play­wrights," Jones wrote, "and we will not have them unless we give them many outlets to see their plays produced. This is the best way in which they can learn to write better plays." So now, 47 years later, how have America's regional theatres done in terms of Jones' vision? Is there a problem? If so, what is the scope?

Despite being a theatre person, I kind of like crunching numbers. So I decided to check out the TCG Theatre Profiles database, which has an "advanced search" screen that allows me to search for the specific information I am seeking. Once there, I decided that the best place to start searching for Jones' vision were with the League of Resident Theatres (LORT) institutions, the 73 regional theatres that one might see as following in the footsteps of Jones' Dallas theatre. So I clicked on "LORT membership" and "American Premiere" and "World Premiere" (I didn't want theatres getting credit for importing plays like Stoppard's Coast of Utopia, which was not only considered an American premiere but counted as three productions, one for each part!) for the 2006-2007 season. The results were interesting, to say the least.

TCG separates its theatres into six categories according to the size of their annual budgets. They are:

Category 6: $499K or less
Category 5: $500K - $1M
Category 4: $1M - $3M
Category 3: $3M - $5M
Category 2: $5M - $10M
Category 1: $10M or more

In the 2006-2007 season, the 73 LORT institutions broke down into the categories as follows:

Category 6: $499K or less = 19
Category 5: $500K - $1M = 1
Category 4: $1M - $3M = 12
Category 3: $3M - $5M = 11
Category 2: $5M - $10M = 23
Category 1: $10M or more = 7

So of these 73 wealthy non-profit theatres, 56% of which had budgets over three million dollars, how many of them had at least one American Premiere during the 2006 - 2007 season? 15, or a measly 20.5%. Four out of five American LORT institution did not feel it was necessary to support American playwriting. They broke down as follows:

Category 6: $499K or less = 19 theatres --> 5
Category 5: $500K - $1M = 1 theatre --> 0
Category 4: $1M - $3M = 12 theatres --> 1
Category 3: $3M - $5M = 11 theatres --> 4
Category 2: $5M - $10M = 23 theatres --> 5
Category 1: $10M or more = 7 theatres --> 0

At those 15 theatres that did have an World and American premiere, there was a grand total of 27 productions. They broke down as follows:

Category 6: $499K or less = 19 theatres --> number of productions: 15
Category 5: $500K - $1M = 1 theatre --> number of productions: 0
Category 4: $1M - $3M = 12 theatres --> number of productions: 1
Category 3: $3M - $5M = 11 theatres --> number of productions: 4
Category 2: $5M - $10M = 23 theatres --> number of productions: 7
Category 1: $10M or more = 7 theatres --> number of productions: 0

Look at that carefully: 55.5% of the American premieres during the 2006-2007 season were produced in theatres with the smallest budgets. In fact, a single Category Six theatre produced nearly as many American premieres all of the theatres in Categories 1 through 5 combined: The Actors Theatre of Louisville (10 productions). Without the Actors Theatre of Louisville's commitment to the American playwright, there would have been a anemic 17 world premiere productions of American plays on LORT stages.

If we wonder why American playwrights find themselves drawn to film or television, we need look no further than these statistics, which to me reflects an appalling lack of interest in the fate of American theatre by the artistic leaders of our country. More evidence of the Schiavo-ization of the American theatre.

A Question for NY and Chicago Bloggers

Over the years, I have watched as many of you created productions in NYC and Chicago. I was wondering if you could outline the costs associated with such productions. How much does it cost to rent a space? What about rehearsals -- where do they take place and how much does it cost? What other expenses are associated with such a production?