Has Theatre Failed America?

From Denver, Thursday June 12...approximately 7:45 Mountain Time...

Mike Daisey's provocative solo performance How Theatre Failed America has had the TCG Conference buzzing, as it seems as if many of the attendees are indicted in his piece. Last night's sold out, standing room only performance included a number of major figures in the regional theatre field in the audience, including Pulitzer prize-winning playwright Paula Vogel, Actors Theatre of Louisville Artistic Director Marc Masterson, Alliance Theatre Artistic Director Susan Booth, current TCG executive director Theresa Eyering and former TCG executive director Ben Cameron.

The boiled down crux of Daisey's very funny, poignant, thoughtful, provoking and absolutely engaging performance is that the American regional theatre movement (of which AGL is a member) has sold its soul for a building...and by doing so, we have largely dis empowered the artists whose work is at the very center of our life: the actors. Throughout his piece, Daisey interchanges the words "institution" (which we like) with "corporation"(which is baaaadddd)...blaming the desire to grow institutions (by which he means build buildings) while simultaneously failing to provide actors with a living wage for their work. It is an interesting discussion for our field and Daisey's dramatization has really helped focus the conversation, as seen at an often raucous 90 minute panel discussion response this morning at 8:00 AM (not a good time for theatre people!!) that featured another capacity crowd.

Daisey, who really is a cross between Wallace Shawn, Chris Farley and Lewis Black, asks us to consider a couple of things -- 1)Who are we making our art for?, and 2)Is the system by which we create the art broken? Daisey's description of Artistic Directors as "madmen" buffeted and beaten from all sides by the competing demands of the job completely resonated with me! I would argue that Daisey is simply asking us to reclaim some of the positions of the pioneers of our movement that we seem to have willfully abandoned. One of the major tenants of the regional theatre revolution, as articulated over a half century ago by the likes of Zelda Fichandler, Margo Jones, Nina Vance, W. McNeil Lowry and others was the idea that artists should have the right to live and work in the communities they choose and that they should be paid something approximating a living wage for their work...this was a radical notion a half century ago and remains one today. I would have an easier time getting someone to sponsor the bathroom of a theatre than an actual actor, of whom we are often suspicious of the work they do. 500 years ago, actors couldn't be buried in consecrated ground, our distrust of them continues to this day. Boards of Trustees are much more comfortable helping to fund and approve funding for development directors, marketing directors, props designers...people who create tangible things, than an actor whose work is ephemeral and disappears into the ether after each performance. Is our system broken? Can it be repaired? Will we ever be able to find a way to articulate our importance to our greater communities? Our society loves stars and celebrities...working actors are an entirely different breed. It is a contradiction we have not been able to overcome.

So what we have now are essentially "ghetto cathedrals of high art", large impersonal buildings that house marketing departments, development departments, education departments, everything but actors -- they are a dime a dozen, flown in from New York to live in a dorm for 7-8 weeks with no connection to the community they are working, spending their one day a week off back in New York auditioning for their next gig somewhere else...Something is rotten in the state of American theatre...

A few personal anecdotes and then we are off to a reception at the Curious Theatre Company...
1. Richmond, VA allows TheatreVirginia, a 47 year old regional theatre, to wither and die in 2002 while simultaneously spending nearly $100 million for a performing arts center, that as of 2008 has still not opened. $2 million could have secured the future of TVA and provided jobs for the local theatre community that no other organization in Richmond, even now nearly 7 years later, is capable of providing.

2. A very good actor I know who lives in a community that has a legitimate theatrical ecosystem featuring a major regional theatre at the top of the chain, is told by the AD of that Tony Award-winning theatre that he would love to hire her, if only she lived in New York instead of the city she actually lives in!

3. A friend of mine who is a company member at a major regional theatre that recently opened a new facility that cost approximately $125 million says that the only place the designers cut corners to save costs, thereby diminishing the quality of the space, were the spaces that directly involved the actors: rehearsal rooms, dressing rooms, green rooms...the joke is that where the audience sits is the plantation house and where the actors work is the slave quarters. Actors can have a wonderful sense of gallows humor...it is unfortunate that they are required to use it so much!!

If you have any answers, or thoughts, let me know...I'd love to hear from you...

Finally, word from the home front is that Merry Wives of Windsor had a very successful opening tonight. I am sorry I missed it but I can't wait to get out to Equus Run next week, bottle of wine in hand, and check out Tony Haigh and company's magnificent work!!

Won't you join me at the theatre, in this case, the lovely vineyard in Midway??

Peace and Love
Rick St. Peter