Tag Archives: nonprofit theatres

Link Roundup! – 6/3/16

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Aneesh Sheth, MJ Kaufman, Shakina Nayfack and Kate Bornstein (Photos by Eric McNatt, taken on location at The Covenant House headquarters.)

Playbill has a great interview with several trans artists talking about representation in theatre:

The American theatre has always been at the forefront of social movements. We were the first to have interracial relations onstage, well before they were acceptable on television or film. Same with same-sex relationships. But then it feels like, in terms of mainstream and commercial theatre and trans stories—it seems like we’re behind. Why do you think that is?

TD: There is the money issue—you’re asking theatres to take a risk and to get educated. All that requires time, money and capacity. You might have to break westernized theatre protocols to educate your front-of-house staff about gender neutral bathrooms or take your ushers aside and teach them how to engage with someone who’s gender neutral.
MJK: I think it’s happening at the fringe and smaller levels. I hope that one day actors get cast in a role because they’re right for the role and they’re good actors. Not because of their gender identity.
BM: I think safety is still an issue. There is a risk involved with visibility, as trans people are still facing violence and harassment. I also feel like there are still biases that almost all marginalized theatremakers face from financiers or venue owners who have their own personal disinterests in our stories or believe that our projects won’t attract a profitable audience.

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The New York Times has a feature on The Sol Project:

The Sol Project, a new initiative to raise the profile of Latino artists in theater, will make its debut in November with Hilary Bettis’s play “Alligator,” presented with the company New Georges.

The initiative plans to partner with 12 Off Broadway companies to produce one play per season. So far six companies have been announced: New Georges, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, the Public Theater, Labyrinth Theater Company, Atlantic Theater Company and Women’s Project Theater.

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Link Roundup! – 1/8/16

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Daveed Diggs (center) as Thomas Jefferson in “Hamilton.” (Photo by Joan Marcus)

American Theatre published a post in support of the playwrights that a few recent casting controversies centered around, and include over 1300 signatures from artists and students across the country who share their support:

Yes, this can be a complex and nuanced discussion. Yes, we enter into those discussions with different perspectives and familiarity with the issues. Yes, the missions of educational institutions are different from those of professional theatres. It is critical, however, that we don’t let those differences and complexities keep us from acknowledging the systemic racism that afflicts our country, nor our power as storytellers and community builders to end it.

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NPR highlights a recent article from The Atlantic about color-blind casting, arguing that color-conscious casting in film and television leads to a richer viewing experience:

We know that whiteness often masquerades as a kind of baseline experience without inflection or inclination in American life, and so we tend to buy the idea that progress for actors of color means a choice between roles in which their character’s race is either utterly unremarked upon (see early Grey’s Anatomy), or where race is the entire point (12 Years a Slave and other productions About Race^TM and hardship).

Of course, the backgrounds of the characters needn’t be foregrounded in every scene for it to be acknowledged. I’m thinking of Creed, the very good recent entry to the Rocky canon that doesn’t run away from the fact that the successor to the Italian Stallion is a black dude who navigates a distinctly black social setting. The same could also be said of Master of None, Aziz Ansari’s Netflix series about the life of a struggling actor in New York. The show is sometimes a straight-ahead romantic comedy, and other times it deals directly with the way being desi complicates and informs the professional and personal life of Aziz’s character. (It probably matters that both are the creations of people of color.)

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CHESHIRE ISAACS/IMPACT THEATRE GOP presidential candidate Len (played by Michael Uy Kelly) is interviewed by a cable news personality (Matthew Lai) in “Mutt,” a wild satire about race and politics playing at Berkeley’s Impact Theatre. ( it )

Impact Theatre, based in the Bay Area, has announced that they will be closing later this year:

“We’re stuck in a weird financial place because most grants require you to have an annual budget of $100,000 or more,” Hillman says. “And we can’t make enough in ticket sales to grow. All that money to grow comes from grants and donations, and when we’re doing new plays by emerging playwrights in a basement with pizza and beer, our audience always skews really young, and those people just don’t have a lot of money. That was the audience we wanted, that was the audience we went for, and that was part of the whole point of keeping ticket prices accessible.”

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The Nonprofit with Balls blog has some good reminders about how the term equity, while a great goal to strive for, can easily be watered down and turned into another meaningless buzzword:

At this early stage in the development of equity as a mainstream concept, the dissonance is understandable. We are all still trying to grasp what equity is and what it means for our field. But there are too many instances of dissonance out there that if we don’t stop to reflect, there is danger of “Equity” doing more harm than good, since it can lull us into a false sense of security. True equity requires us not to just throw around concepts at summits and sprinkle terminologies on websites and strategic plans, but to reevaluate our beliefs and practices and definitions and board and staff composition and leadership and hiring practice and funding allocation processes and who is at the table and who set the table in the first place, etc. It requires us to change our ways of doing things.

Link Roundup! – 12/11/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Playwright Dominque Morisseau’s recent essay for American Theatre addresses the loaded social politics of theatre etiquette and the inherent privilege present in many theatre spaces:

We take their donor money and put them on boards, and we brush their microaggressions off as our old grandma or grandpa who might be a little racist and elitist but are otherwise harmless.

To that I ask: harmless to whom? I am telling you it is not harmless. It is harmful. It further marginalizes audiences of color and tells them they are not fully welcome in the theatre, except by permission of the white audience. It tells the upper-middle-class white audience that theatre is their home first and the rest of us are just guests.

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The Atlantic has a story about a graduate art project at the State University of New York at Buffalo that brought up issues of safe spaces and artistic intent:

Activists who say the display crossed a line insist that they are not focused on the artist or her intentions, but are concerned instead with the impact of the project on students and the administration response. Nevertheless, the controversy highlights the fact that many students view free speech as a critical part of, and not a diversion from, conversations over race on campus. Yet even so, students don’t necessarily agree on what constitutes a threat to free speech.

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Link Roundup – 11/6/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Photograph: Mark Douet

The Guardian has an article asking organizations to consider how they impact the local communities that don’t necessarily see their work:

Every theatregoer has an example of a play that changed their life to a greater or lesser extent. However, the real question I reckon theatres need to ask themselves is not whether what they do impacts on those who go to their shows but whether what goes on in their building really has a significant impact for those who have never stepped inside it? This is not about an individual’s response and relationship to a particular show in a particular building, but about a play and a venue’s relationship to the community at large.

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The LA Times has a story summing up the recent stats surrounding theatre donors and attendance:

Theaters are making adjustments by trying new approaches, she said, including more emphasis on shows geared toward children and parents.

The report said that productions for young audiences were “a bright spot” in which attendance grew 12.9% between 2010 and 2014. But childrens’ series accounted for just 3% of total attendance at the 118 theaters surveyed over the five years.

“More theaters would benefit from producing high-quality programming for multigenerational audiences,” Eyring said. “Not only because the numbers tend to be on the rise, but it’s a way of engaging the next generation of theatergoers.”

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Link Roundup! – 8/14/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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The Nonprofit with Balls blog has a post on what he calls “The Nonprofit Hunger Games”:

We become biased toward those who survive: In the Hunger Games, the youngest kids, the sweetest, kindest ones, are usually the first to get killed. Everyone bets against them. In the Nonprofit Hunger Games, funders bet on which nonprofits are the most “sustainable” and invest in those organizations. Instead of holistically looking at problems and systems, society just funds those organizations we think will be strongest and most likely to survive. And since we fund these more “sustainable” organizations, then of course these organizations are likelier to survive, while the smaller, “weaker” organizations (often led by marginalized communities) are left to struggle. We start to believe that those organizations that survive deserve it, that those who fail also deserve it. But simply because a nonprofit is good at surviving, it does not necessarily mean that it is most effective at solving community problems.

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Phil Weaver-Stoesz’s essay on HowlRound about delegating tasks has some great reminders for us busy theatre folks:

As artists, we are trained to be recklessly optimistic about how much we can handle. We’re fast learners, we love our art, and we have something big to say, so what can go wrong? We approach the world with laptops in hand, ready to create. The problem is, we burn out. We enter the process full of passion, but halfway through we peeter out in a train wreck of procrastination, fear and self-doubt. I call it, the “Puppydog Black Hole” problem.

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Link Roundup! – 7/31/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Two students from the creative:connection project collaborate on a piece of music. Photograph: Create

The Guardian has a story about how theatre and the arts can connect youth with disabilities with non-disabled kids:

National statistics show that 65% of people avoid disabled people because they don’t know how to act around them, while 67% say they feel uncomfortable when talking to a disabled person. A survey by Scope and Mumsnet also found that four in 10 parents said their disabled child rarely or never had the opportunity to socialise with non-disabled children.

This project has been designed to bring disabled and non-disabled students together to create friendships and a shared understanding. Not all communication is verbal – which the creative arts are a great way to show. By encouraging these young people to work together, listen to one another and explore communication through sound, music, art and movement, we’re breaking down some of those social barriers and strengthening bonds between disabled and non-disabled people.

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This past month, the Globe and Mail has been running a series following the theatre program of a Canadian high school as they rehearse and mount a musical. Parts 1-5 are online now:

After a decade of writing about the art form he loves, critic J. Kelly Nestruck found himself in a moment of crisis. Theatre, it seemed, had grown elitist and out of touch with the country it was supposed to entertain. To renew his faith, he went back to where it all began: high school. But can a group of teens enduring their own struggles prove that theatre is still worth fighting for?

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Link Roundup! – 7/23/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Berkeley Rep’s teen council gathers at a monthly meeting. (Photo by Ben Hanna)

American Theatre Magazine has a story about how regional theatres are using teen programming to change the makeup of their audiences:

Large theatre institutions can seem impenetrable to high schoolers. Narrow programming interests, high ticket costs, and a lack of diversity are just a few of the barriers that can make theatres feel unwelcoming, or worse, irrelevant to teen audiences. So it’s hardly surprising that many theatres are working to break down these walls and integrate teens into their organizations—and not only into their audiences. Through teen council or teen ensemble programs, young folks all over the country are getting hands-on experiences at regional theatres, where they learn all aspects of producing theatre, receive leadership training, and make important contributions to their respective institutions.

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On her blog, Melissa Hilllman breaks down the issues with the overuse of the word “offended”:

People who are resisting bigotry are often dismissed with the belittling idea that they’re “offended,” as if fighting cultural oppression and the tools with which it creates, disseminates, and preserves that oppression are equivalent to an imaginary schoolmarm shocked at finding the word “fuck” carved into a desk. No, we are not “offended.” We’re fighting bigotry, and it’s belittling to pretend it’s just about offending our personal, delicate sensibilities.

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The How-To Guide for Promoting Diversity in Arts Management

Last month, Howlround published a piece by Elena Muslar entitled “Racial and Ethnic Diversity in Arts Management: An Exposé and Guide.” The article focused on Muslar’s research as part of her MFA thesis, which contained interviews that demonstrated common challenges and hang-ups the success and promotion of people of color. In her “Expose and Guide,” Muslar includes questions, suggestions, and pathways to creating opportunity and access into arts management positions.

Muslar noted four common responses in her interviews to current arts managers, about why there were not more people of color in leadership positions in their organizations:

“My organization does try to reach out to people of color but they don’t apply.”
“I’m not really sure why we haven’t had people of color in leadership positions.”
“I fear my own voice in this conversation.”
“I’m not sure how to get young people of color interested in this field.”

These answers are not surprising, and by now near commonplace. However, they are important to hear, and identify, so we can move past these fears and misconceptions. Without recognizing the hesitations, we are unable to challenge them, and consequently, leave them behind.

In all four responses, uncertainty is a common link. Responders are not sure why there is a lack of diversity in leadership, where their place is in the conversation, or how to resolve the issue. Uncertainty, here, is defeating. Rather than asking questions about how to perceive and create change, they are resolved in their inability and their unknowing.

Muslar does more than just raise these questions though, she provides answers.

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Link Roundup! – 6/5/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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Julissa Rodriguez – Gabriel Garcia Roman

NPR’s feature of photographer Gabriel Garcia Roman’s portraits of queer people of color, inspired by fresco paintings of saints, is so awesome:

The photo series, called “Queer Icons,” evokes the colorful, religious artwork that Roman grew up with. “Because I grew up Catholic in a Mexican community in Chicago, my first introduction to art was religious art,” he says…And because Roman’s subjects are activists and artists who do good for the community, “I wanted to represent them as saints,” he says. He also wanted to capture their pride and their strength. “I wanted them to be warriors — that’s why a lot of them are looking straight at the camera, saying ‘Here I am, and I’m not going to hide.'”

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This Guardian article asks an important question: how would you explain theatre to somebody who’s never been?

There’s been lots of talk recently around the idea that theatre sometimes feels too much like an exclusive club for those who are in the know. Questions are being asked about why so many people think that it’s not for them – something I touched upon in a blog earlier this year. Figures from the Warwick Commission make worrying reading: the wealthiest, best educated and least ethnically diverse 8% of society make up nearly half of live music audiences and a third of theatregoers and gallery visitors…Perhaps what we don’t talk about enough is the pleasure of theatre, how it makes us feel, and why those of us who go frequently love it so much.

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Link Roundup! – 5/8/15

Link Roundups feature articles and bits of internet goodness that our dramaturgy team digs up. If you find something you want to send our way, drop us a line on Facebook or Twitter!

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A 60-foot community mural was created outside of the Prudential Center on Memorial Day last year. Photo: Globe file

The Boston Globe recently highlighted some national trends in city development and looked at how arts and culture can be integrated into the development happening in Boston:

More cities have undertaken cultural planning to shape a coherent approach to advancing the arts. Cultural planning looks different in each place, as it should. Yet, when we consider the cities where cultural planning has been most effective, we consistently find an ambitious, inclusive, communitywide effort to develop a shared vision and blueprint for arts and culture — one that prioritizes, coordinates, and aligns public and private resources to strengthen cultural vitality long term.

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Create Equity looked at the barriers that prevent people from participating in cultural and artistic activities if they are from lower socioeconomic and educational backgrounds:

Data from the survey shows that fewer low-income individuals attend pop and rock concerts than their wealthier counterparts, and significantly fewer of them attend visual arts festivals and craft fairs. In fact, people with lower incomes and less education are less likely to read books, go to the movies, take an arts class, play a musical instrument, sing, dance socially, take or edit photographs, paint, make scrapbooks, engage in creative writing, or make crafts. All told, the data paints a consistent portrait of lower participation by low-SES adults in a breathtaking range of visual, performing, literary, and film activities…When large numbers of people face barriers to participating in the arts in the way they might want to, we know that we’re missing opportunities to improve people’s lives in concrete and meaningful ways.

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