DC-area theatre lovers got some good news and some bad news this week.
The good news is that Washington, D.C. continues to be a robust theatre town. According to data which the Helen Hayes Awards released this week, 2007 saw the dawn of six new theatre companies (and the sunset of three), an increase in the number of shows produced from 434 to 454, and a vigorous 5.3% increase in the number of productions – from 7648 to 8050. Twenty-five theaters reported an increase in attendance, while only twenty-two reported a decline.
The bad news is that for the fifth year in a row, overall attendance declined in 2007. Paid attendance was 1,908,557, a decrease of 36,912, or 1.9%, from 2006, according to the annual Helen Hayes Awards survey. (This number includes audiences for all professional companies but does not include the roughly 19,000 attendees at the Washington Fringe Festival).
Helen Hayes President and CEO laid part of the blame on the recession. “In an uncertain economy,” she noted, “art is often among the first things to be eliminated from discretionary spending.”
We agree, as far as it goes. 2007 was a rough year, for Washington and the country. But can that explain a five-year decline? During the past five years, Washington has experienced a renaissance of sorts, including a noticeable rise in the area-wide standard of living, significant economic and quality-of-life recovery by the City, and a theatrical building boom that has touched Studio, Signature, Olney, Shakespeare, Round House and – soon – Arena. So why hasn’t this been accompanied by an increased interest in theatre?
We don’t think it’s an issue of quality. From what we’ve seen, quality has improved as brilliant new talents like Alexander Strain, Kimberly Gilbert, Aaron Posner and John Vreeke have established themselves. And the proliferation of theatre companies has resulted in coverage of a wide range of niches – including thoughtful Christian (Journeyman Theater) and Jewish (Theater J) productions, new plays (Charter Theater), new musicals (Signature), contemporary Irish theatre (Solas Nua and Keegan’s New Island Project) and cutting-edge drama (Rorschach, Forum, Washington Shakespeare Theatre). We have two theaters devoted to Shakespeare – Folger and Shakespeare Theatre. We now even have a company devoted to plays about science (Active Cultures).
So what’s happening? We thought we’d turn the question over to the experts – you, the Washington theatre-going (and theatre-growing) community. Why do you think attendance has been in a five-year decline? And what do you think ought to be done about it? Let’s generate a conversation – not, please, about gripes you may have with individual productions or individual theatre companies – but about the overall issues which you think are affecting the sustainable life of this community.
Let’s find some solutions. Leave your thoughts in the comments section below.
How about talking about the theatre companies that saw an increase in tickets sold? What are they doing that is bucking the trend?
Regarding theater critics, I don’t have respect for a lof of local critics. I think the level of theater critics is not comparable to the high level of theatre in the Washington area. How do we get more better critics? By that, I mean ones that actually have some qualifications. How about getting some that don’t have personal agendas to promote or destroy certain types of shows? How about getting some that aren’t full of themselves?
Just a quick note. For those people interested in finding theater in their local area there are some resources on-line that can help.
For community theater, the best site out there is Scott Bloom’s SRBnet (www.srbnet.com) which has a bulletin board of which companies are auditioning, which are opening shows, etc. If you don’t find it on the main page bulletin board, you can also click on the links to MD, DC or VA and find the link to virtually all of the community theaters in the DC metro area and visit their own web-site. Most community theaters do post their season or upcoming show when possible.
Potomac Stages (http://www.potomacstages.com/) is a wonderful resource for both professional and community theaters. Their “Playing This Week” page is a good place to go like the movie listings when you happen to find yourself with an evening free for the theater. And their “Master Theater List” is pretty complete.
There are good resources to find theater near you on the web that is solely for local DC-area theater.
Reading these comments long distance from Los Angeles has been an extremely interesting experience for me, to say the least– because although a great deal has changed in the metro area’s theatre scene since I left 21 (eek) years ago, I’m seeing some of the very same issues on the table now, for you guys, that were just as frustrating (even disastrous) back in my day.
Just one example, and a significant one that I’m surprised to find still a problem 2 decades later: the Washington Post still has only one critic as far as I can tell… and he can’t make it to even a fraction of the shows that need to be reviewed to survive… and many times, as one respondent noted somewhere above, the review, if there is one, comes too late to be of any use… as in, the last weekend of a show, after a run during which the actors might find themselves voting whether to even go on or not if we realized that we, in the cast, outnumbered the audience on any given night.
Of course back when I was a local actor in D.C., (boy this is making me feel old) we didn’t have the internet to turn to… for what it’s worth, it’s my impression that, in the metro area, a far higher percentage of the potential “theatre-going” public read the Post (and get their show info from it), than read, for example, the L.A. Times here, and make their “entertainment-consumption” choices based upon anything they might read therein. The internet and word of mouth do seem to rule the day, as– for “artists,” at least, the newspaper seems sadly defunct. But maybe it’s for the best since it can break the monopoly imposed by a solitary critic who, to put the best spin on it, is at the very least “stretched too thin.”
Thanks for asking and the answer is MONEY any way you look at it. Im a suburban senior and an actress/teacher. I need a car to get downtown and thus need to park and pay a fee. Even when I can make pwyc with gas prices I find it is getting to be a luxury I and others can’t afford. I gave up a juicy role in DC last fall because what the company could pay wasn’t covering even my gas. I seem to be more and more of a nonprofit organization with no grants available. I’ve spent six decades of my life playing theatre and or teaching it. Living without it is the pits but I know well the ecconomics especially of small theatre companies and it is tough to say cut prices. I don’t have an answer and the subway way out to the burbs late at night is not attractive for this old lady.
Liz,
Fortunately, the Washington Post has multiple reviewers now. Peter Marks who was referred to above, is the most prominent but not the only one. The Washington Post also employs Nelson Pressley (who moderated today’s after show discussion with Stephen Schwartz at MetroStage) and Michael Toscano to name a few. I don’t know exactly how many reviewers the post has, but WaPo does have a few.
A link to most of the area reviewers can be found on this site. We post to it every morning. Go to Their Reviews
http://dctheatrescene.com/their-reviews/.
I hope that anyone who hasn’t yet commented on why they – their children, their friends and neighbors – aren’t going to theatre will still write in.
The conversation has been very interesting. I know that theatres are reading along. The discussion has provoked some ideas for change here on DCTS. I’ll announce them soon.
Lorraine Treanor, Editor
The theatre company I manage in Howard County, MD, the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company, is young and our audience is growing. A key reason for this is that we offer FREE children’s tickets to our outdoor productions and sometimes to our indoor matinees. It helps grow our audience and it allows children easily to be introduced to Shakespeare on the stage not the page. We do struggle with more adult-oriented fare (A Doll’s House) but overall our numbers are growing. And by offering special Sunday family oriented performances that are well-publicized, that squirmy 3 year old (and we get a lot of them) is not unexpected at that performance and therefore not hated by the rest of the audience (and hopefully taken for a walk!).
I love the theater; I grew up at the theater my parents are Humanities profs and I remember going to free theater events first as a small child with my parents and then going free through my schools generally to dress rehersal or PWYC kind of nights. Later I worked as a techie for summer stock(oh how I wish I could sing or act) and would watch new batches of grade school kids comming to dress or early night shows. What is my problem here? the simple answer is two fold first money it is hard to find the kind of money to go consistantly to the theater. Opera is 80$ a pop for a single ticket the standards are also generally too rich for my blood. Second I find out about show too late. I would have loved to see teller’s take on macbeth but I didnt hear about it until the final week and it was sold out. Ditto to bunches of other shows as well. Since discovering this site I hope that I will find out early like several months out what show are going to be around in fact suggestion to this site is to have a calander with what shows are playing at what venues. COuld be all kinds of snazzy different colors for different theaters showing the runs. This would be of such a great help for planning also better or easier ways to find out how much a show costs with out actually having to go to the pay now part of a site.
Having critics is a double-edged sword. Powerful critics have hurt some wonderful shows.
Thanks Ted, for the clarification… I think I must have misunderstood the situation– from reading the comments I came away with the definite impression that the WaPo was still the “dominant” source for show info & reviews, and that there was one “dominant” critic, as another respondent on this site termed it. Good to know there are now multiple critics. Question… do they have the influence (readership) to get butts in seats?
The other challenge still remains… the critics getting there too late to do the production any good.
I spent a lot of time in the Metro area over the past several years, attending as much theatre as I could afford to see (!!! yet another big issue well-covered here) and I experienced an odd sense of disconnect between the reviews… and the actual quality of the show. In both directions– some excellent shows dismissed off-handedly and even sarcastically in the WaPo review… and some raves for shows disappointing enough that I left on show at intermission, which I rarely do It seemed more than a matter of simply my own personal taste differing from the critic’s taste, though, as upon comparing notes with friends in the area, they reported a mistrust of long-standing toward the Post critic’s critical assessments.
One last thing: the enthusiasm for, and investment in, theatre in the metro area is absolutely staggering, with the kind of exhilarated, inspired and committed theatre community only dreamed about back when I was working locally. From the perspective of living on the other coast in a city with abundant and excellent theatre that “goes nowhere, never catches fire” in the words of actor Ed Harris, what I’m saying is, the issues being addressed in this column are “a great problem to have.” Here in L.A. is the opposite problem; as Harris told the LA Times last June while doing a one-man LaBute piece, “…there’s excellent theatre here… I’ve done the best work of my life in the theatre here… but nobody cares. it’s like you do the work and it just floats up and out and disappears over the Pacific Ocean, for all the effect it has on anyone. It’s like it never happened.”
My point is, where there’s LIFE, there’s HOPE. And I am optimistic that with a community like the one you all are part of, these many of the issues that bedevil you can be surmounted. (The gas prices, however, I dunno…)
Dear readers –
Soaring ticket prices seems to be the #1 reason given for the drop in attendance, so we had a look. We were surprised to learn that of the 31 productions now playing or opening this month, 10 had non-discounted tickets of $20 or less.
So – as a result of your comments, ONSTAGE NOW has been changed from an alpha list to one grouped by ticket price. Check it out here:
http://dctheatrescene.com/now-playing/
Further discounts are available from the individual theatres, from TICKETPLACE,GOLDSTAR (see their advert on this page, and by checking in every day to DCTS’ HOT TICKETS
http://dctheatrescene.com/hot-tickets/
This is one case where it “It Is NOT The Economy Stupid“. This is not about last year or even last week. I have been hearing this ever since DCTR started.
What are the constants?
1. Theatre nuts like us.
2. Actors and their extended friends and family.
3. Long time subscribers
Of this group each year a certain number of theatre goers get older and no longer attend due to health or simply death.
Who replaces them? Not the young because no one targets them. DCTS had a desire to start a Kids Theatre site, no one was interested! Sports, Live Music, Video Games, Film and now HD TV blitz them with ads. Everyone better wake up or someday live theatre as you now know it will be a thing of the past in DC.
It is mareting plain and simple.. Actually the lack of it. The “If You Produce It They Will Come” mentality is in play and surprise!!! does not work.
Ronnie- I think that you’ve got a good point. I bet there is something to the fact that the audiences around here are older and each year some of those folks are dropping out of the scene for one reason or another and not being proportionally replaced.
Where I disagree with you is that there are two professional theater companies in particular where I see loads of younger people. Those are Synetic and Teatro de la Luna. As far as community theaters go I’ve notices large number of young people at the Elden Street Players, Kensington Arts, and the the Reston Community Players. All 3 of these community theaters do some very nice work in my opinion- often on the same level as some of the professional theaters and with some of the same actors. By the way Teatro de la Luna offers baby-sitting service provided that patrons request this service in advance. These theater companies are doing something right!
There is interest in the kids page on this site. I have submitted ideas twice to this site and have never heard back–maybe I did not have the correct address.
Anyway, if you want interest in the kid’s site, there needs to be more activity on the page. There is not much there. Why was no one interested? Maybe a better question is how do you know there was no interest?
Kids in the area ARE actually very interested in theater. Has anyone here been involved or observed the CAPPIES program? This is HUGE in High School Drama. Maybe theaters could take advantage of this huge pool of interested kids. Set up partnerships; some existing programs…Round House Theatre has the Sarah Play… Journeymen Theater use to (don’t know if they still do) have a mentoring program with Herndon High School. Wouldn’t it be neat if students from XYZ High were invited to see an open rehearsal of an STC production or help build sets for a Scena Theater production? Maybe these are unrealistic ideas but there are countless other opportunites where area high school kids could be exposed to the vast amount of professional theater opportunities in our area — workshops, meet the artists, hands-on stage craft, behind the scenes tours, artist consultation for high school drama productions. Many of these opportunities are inexpensive.
How about if a group of CAPPIE Nominees perform a number at the Helen Hayes awards or a group of Helen Hayes nominees attend a CAPPIE’s reception? Local professional actors, directors, designers, etc…support a mixed workshop where kids can meet and learn from their local professionals?
For starters, maybe a link to the CAPPIES program and/or high school productions be added to this site. Are you aware that there are students who are trained to be CAPPIE Reviewers?–these students write the reviews for the CAPPIE productions. Maybe some of these kids would be interested in reviewing programs for DCTheatreScene!
Please don’t write off the younger generation to video games, movies, ipods, etc…the CAPPIES speak for the depth and breadth of interest that theater (both onstage and offstage) sparks in our local youth!
I’ve been following this discussion with avid interest. Theater in live performance will never die. There will always be “nuts” like us around, (referring to Ronnie Ruff’s comment). I liked the comment about the Miller retrospectives. I agree. I love drama from historical periods, insights into our own American experience, what it means to be American. I guess that’s because basically I love the theater because– of all the forms of art– live performance on stage puts life up there where I feel I can touch it, walk in and be a part of it. It opens a window to history, philosophy and other points of view. It helps me live. Once I saw a Greek play performed in Athens, Greece, and it changed my life. Then I saw Euripedes’ The Bacchae, at Stratford, Canada, that so terrified me, I came out of the theater trembling with the memory of a human being being mutilated and torn apart by the Bachhae, a frenzied bunch of women,followers of Dionysus. It was far, far less graphic than any Hollywood techno-splattering of blood, (what I grew up with in L.A.) but in my mind, that staged experience on a horse-shoe, thrust stage was horrific. Maybe it was because all my fears of the human capacity for cruelty, for the out-of-control forces in human nature, were played out. Or I wonder if it’s because I fear the concealed cruelty in other women. All I know is I came out of the theater feeling better, more balanced, more alive and gentled toward others around me, and I never forgot that play-going experience.
Bottom line, it’s the prices. People’s pockets are not bottomless. But keep the faith. We will always act out. Theater makes it safe. We still wake up alive the next morning. Rosalind Lacy MacLennan
Bah! Nobody responded to my question: Which theaters saw an increase in attendance? Maybe we can learn something from them?
To Janet: I don’t know the answer is the reason I didn’t respond directly to your excellent question. Maybe one of the dramaturgs or theater managers could tell us, if they are on-line to read our comments. I would venture to say that Arena is doing all right, based on almost full houses for the Miller retrospective. Also the GALA’s Blood Wedding, by Garcia Lorca, a classic with philosophical insight, poetic language, beautiful surrealist set design, a rarely produced, challenging classic of modern Spanish Theater. The performance we attended, they were bringing in extra chairs to seat an overflow. The GALA takes risks with new plays, like the one by Venezualan Gustavo Ott. Primarily GALA sticks to their mission of the Spanish Golden Age, their history, their heritage. “Doubt” at Olney seemed to do okay. It’s tough for us to get an overview based on one or two performances we may see. Rosalind
I have to say, that convenience plays a huge part in our ability to attend certain shows. On Friday we went to see the Arena production of DEATH OF A SALESMAN. We had to commute via Metro (which is 20 minutes from our home) since we’ve tried commuting to Crystal City/Shirlington at rush hour before and it takes us over an hour and a half from the PG County/Greenbelt/Laurel area. Unfortunately, the trip home took us an hour and 20 minutes just to get to the Greenbelt Metro station since we had to wait 16 and then 14 minutes for the two trains and for some reason the trains were moving slower than usual. So, we left the theater at 11:00 and got home at 12:45.
In general, will tend to avoid any theater inside the beltway except on a Saturday or Sunday. It’s too difficult to get in and out of town on weekdays. And then for those where we have to pay parking…even worse.
I really think that picking Crystal City for the temporary location of Arena was a poor idea. If they had gone across the river towards the new Nationals park area, I think they would have had better success. My experience wasn’t singular. I’ve heard from theater-going friends that the new location is poor (I won’t even go into the facility itself) and inconvenient. Some of my friends who were subscribers did not subscribe this season due to the new location. Theaters need to think about accessibility to their theaters when they select locations or move.
Everyone makes good points and yet, the Fringe is about to launch year 3 and if it’s anything like the first two years, there will be lines out the door for many shows.
The venues are all over the place, the scripts often brand new, the scheduling completely atypical, the production values “shoestring” no reviews, (those that even appear), have time to come out before a show is over and none of that hurts the Fringe.
It was pointed out above that nearly a third of shows currently up or about to open cost $20 (or less if you do a pwyc or Goldstar.) So why does theater that doesn’t cost much more than the Fringe do less business? Part of it is obviously “Fringe Fever” but is that all? “Fringe Fever” is just a state of mind. Why is it so much harder to go to H St or wherever when it’s not 95 degrees, it’s not 10 o’clock at night and you’ve heard of the show?
Well, the temporary location of Arena is just a few steps, all inside, from the Metro stop. You can’t plaese some people. There is no place that is convenient to everybody. The home location of Arena Stage is not convenient for me.
Ted- I can’t imagine that Arena in Southwest Washington was much more convenient to you then Arena in Crystal City. While the Crystal City venue might not be the ideal venue I bet that it was about as good a choice as Arena had for the transitional period. I mean they’ve got a large venue that’s dedicated to them…they don’t have to compete for that space with anyone. However, I certainly understand the situation you folks find yourself in.
Actually, the traffic in Southeast is significantly easier to deal with than the downtown-Rosslyn-Shirlington-Crystal City area is. The unfortunate problem is that a lot of the loss of business for many theaters (from my experience) is from suburbanites who are having problems commuting. Virginians and Marylanders are not as willing as they used to be to travel around the beltway or across the river or downtown. I know many folks even in the Montgomery County area who aren’t as willing to travel to Northern Virginia sites as they used to be and I have a harder time getting NoVa friends up here to out neck of the woods.
My point was not to pick on Arena itself. The point is that commuting anywhere in the metro area is getting harder and harder and people are reverting back to looking for entertainment that is closer to where they live. Especially on weeknights. So, theaters need to find a way to draw new people from nearby. For both professional and amateur theater, you need to find a way to get the population within 10-15 miles of your location to come out. You can’t rely on good advertisement to drag people in from the far corners of the metro area anymore. Other options is to increase the number of performances on Saturdays and Sundays. Despite the fact that is is very difficult to do a double-header, theaters that do Sat/Sun doubles tend to do better than ones with only Fri/Sat/Sun performances.
My favorite resource for what’s playing is the Potomac Stages weekly e-newsletter. I have forwarded that to many friends who say they have no idea what plays are going on. (I also love that when they’ve reviewed a play the run time is listed–it’s a big help to know if an 8 pm Thursday show will get me home after bed time on a work night.)
I agree with the folks who say that reviews are important. Good reviews are what brought me to see plays in companies that I am now a subscriber to. If there is a play that I want to see, a bad review won’t deter me. But a good review can make a difference if I’m on the fence.
I feel really lucky to be in Washington at a time when there is so much good theater. It enriches my life in countless ways.
Ted- I see you meant. I was assuming that you were taking the metro to Crystal City not driving. I agree – that drive from southwest DC to Arlington is a bear during the weekday rush hour. That was my daily comute for many years.
1. Money
2. Programming — Did you ever think that sometimes you have to program plays that audiences actually want to see? As a die-hard theatre aficionado, and yes, a snob who enjoys the esoteric, I am often astounded by artistic directors who do not recognize that they MUST program plays that will appeal to the masses in order to get people in to see the rest of the work they will produce throughout the season. Note, you don’t have to do an entire season of Bye Bye Birdie, but an entire season of Russian plays? We all know how well it went for the Studio — and, they certainly lost me after that one.
3. Competition — As more and more venues open up around town, people can be choosy. The choosier you become, the less likely you are to see things that you don’t recognize or have an inkling about.
4. Advertising/Critics — Peter Marks needs to get his head out of New York and start reviewing more plays in town. He’s not doing anybody any favors by splitting his time between NY and DC. The plays in DC need his attention.
Cheryl: I would be willing to bet you that if you actually polled the young people you see at these theatres you will find that they are:
Actors or in theatre programs in school.
Related to theatre goers
Friends of the actors in the productions.
My point is we are not bringing in new blood. Kids not connected to theatre do not know it even exists or that it is something other than the Kennedy Center. Kids are bombarded by media advertising everything but theatre. I can tell you that the smaller companies do not have the money to advertise or do not even think it is that important. As to the big theatres they advertise in the theatre sections of print media where these kids do not even go. If I wanted to hide theatre ads from kids I could not do a better job! The marketing is aimed at an aging audience and it is a losing campaign.
I have posted my last comment on a site I started. Good luck with the site folks.
I will always tell the truth as I see it. If I feel that I cannot be honest and open I see no reason to post here.
That is a sad day for me.
I want to thank all of you for spending the time to post your comments here, about why attendance is dropping at our local theatres. Like many of you, I am in the theatre allot, and everywhere I have gone this year, there has rarely been a sell-out, or even more than 2/3 of a theatre filled up, in both the larger and smaller theatres. It worries me.
Because of your comments and this discussion, the theatre commmunity is listening to you. I attended the Helen Hayes Awards ceremony and stayed quite late at the post-performance party, and actors and theatre administrators were talking about this discussion.They are “waking up” and are grateful for your comments and suggestions..
I don’t drive, and I wish that more theatres would consider getting a shuttle to pick up and return theatre goers to their theatres, and back to the metro, for those of us who don’t have cars.
Atlas Theatre has a shuttle from Union Station and that makes it so easy to get to H Street Playhouse also. Thank you Atlas!
I wish Olney Theater and Signature Theatre would do the same. I can’t tell you how many times theatre goers who also don’t drive have told me that they would love to see shows at Olney and Signature, but they just don’t want the hassle of schlepping on the metro and transferring ro a bus or two. It will help fill up their houses, and bring “new blood” into their theatres.
Frankly, I donlt have a problem taking the 7C or 7F bus or the 22A bus from the Pentagon Metro station. I’m glad these buses get you two short blocks from SIgnature’s door.
These buses run everyday of the week and run late – some past 1 AM
- pleanty of time to get back to the metro after an evening performance. And on the weekends, the 22A now runs every 20 minutes. It’s a short – less than 10 minute -) bus ride to Shirlington. But, I do understand others who find this a hassle. A special thanks to Janet who taught me all the bus routes to Signature.
I have a member of The Ushers (www.ushers.us) who schleps two hours on buses to get to most theatres in the area, and her trip could be cut probably 1/3 if there were shuttles from the metro.
I also wanted to comment on the new Arena location, which some of you spoke about. I love it! How convenient is it for metro riders like me to have Arena right in the metro station, and to have choices to eat before and after the show. I never had these food choices at the SW location, (I couldn’t afford the high prices of the waterfront restaurants) so it’s so nice to be able to grab something affordable to eat before the show at Crystal City. I do understand that driving there during the week must be time consuming, but Arena does provide free parking, so that should compensate for the schlep some of you have to endure.
Again, thanks for your comments. They are most appreciated.
I think the shuttle idea is great! The only way for me to get from my home in Rockville to Olney on the weekend is begging friends to drop me off and pick me up. I love Olney’s work, and I could get there more often if there was a shuttle, because I don’t want to wait an hour or more for a bus on a cold or rainy or humid day.
I was a subscriber to Olney for a long time and gave it up because I have a difficult time getting there, now that I don’t drive. I will be writing a letter to them today, about the shuttle suggestion.Thanks for bringing it up. I would resubscribe if I could get to the theater from the Glenmont Metro.
I also wanted to comment on Ted and Barbara Ying’s suggestion about getting a group of friends together to carpool to the theatre. It’s a great idea! I try to get a group together everytime I plan an outing. We have been carpooling Ushers members since day one, and I have been very fortunate that people like Cheryl Leibovitz have beem so generous to do so. Supporting our local theatres must be a group effort.
Also, if you join The Ushers and Footlights’ lists, you have a built in group of theatregoers who you can email to join you on your theatre outing.
It’s a bit pricy, but that’s not my primary reason for not attending. Inconvenient location (for me) is the primary reason. I don’t want to deal with traffic or the metro after commuting all week and working long hours. The temporary location of the Arena Theatre in Crystal City is perfect. I’m there in 5 minutes with plenty of good restaurants all around. I’m going to attend all that I can while it’s in this area.
Netty
Although Ronnie has indicated he won’t be posting again, I wonder if anyone has ideas about bringing in more youths to theatre. Most theatres do offer discounts to them and some are fairly reasonable. Many theatres, as I have said, do have special programs with the schools.Thanks to Joel and others, we have podcasts and blogs.
I do have to disagree about people going to the theatre to see works they know they’ll enjoy .. “the standards.” One of the reasons I’m such a fan of Studio, Woolly, Theatre J, Synetic, Catalyst (look at their gutsy prices right now!) and others is because I get to see productions that are so amazingly new and novel. “Souvenir” was one of the best plays I’d ever seen — but yes, I still enjoy “My Fair Lady” and just about any classic at the Stage Guild. I do agree that many theatres must “bank” on the tried and tested in order to fill in with the more original works… which is too bad. Any talented grant writers out there? Which establishments ARE providing grants?
The only way I can see so much (and if I had more time, I’d see much more) is by volunteering and ushering — certainly a great option for the retired who are still energetic or older youths. I can’t begin to calculate what I save. Ushering allows me to enter a world that I love — so it’s a double bargain to me and I’d like to think I help the theatres, too. I’ve heard from many that they can’t devote the time it takes — and I do understand those constraints.
Traffic in DC has gotten so much worse in the last 20 yrs. And now that I work and live in VA, I’ve had to let Olney, Round House, Rep Stage and others (and forget Balto’s Center Stage, etc) become rarities though this isn’t my preference. If we had a metro like NYC’s subway, how great that would be! Terrific re the shuttles.
Compared to wkend prices at many theatres, the Fringe productions are very low cost. Word of mouth is very effective among many of us (Footlights, Ushers, etc) so reviews aren’t always necessary. We’ve got favorite actors and if they’re performing, we’ll also go.
I would like to request DC Theatrescene do a similar survey asking readers why they go to the theatre. That is a subject that is interesting to me. In fact, I ask myself that sometimes – as weird as it seems.
Good question,Janet. One that could be very interesting. In response, we’ve just started a new discussion ‘So Why Do You Go to Theatre?’
See you there!
I suppose I am in the minority, but I am a 20-something that sees almost everything I can get to via Metro or a short bus/cab ride from a Metro. I usher at many theatres (often amidst of seniors who look at me weird) and have a subscription at a couple of theatres that I can’t get to on time to be an usher (Signature). I don’t make an insane salary, but theatre is what I love and how I choose to spend my free time and money.
As far as the decline, I can attribute it to ticket cost as well as awareness/competition for attention. I work for a large bureaucracy filled with 50-somethings and most everyone I talk to perceives theatre as being too expensive or just something you go see at National or the Kennedy Center as a night out on occasion.
Next season? I am not renewing some of my subscriptions. Too many shows that I just saw in NY on the list at area theatres and not enough truly new stuff. I know that “saw it already a short time ago” problem is not a general one, but it could have an impact on the avid theatre-goer attendance if this trend continues, especially those of us who schlep up to NY every season to catch the new stuff on and off broadway.
I think the point about managing a season is important. If you want subscribers (and let’s face it, subscribers guarantee your income), then you need to do a mix of familiar and new work. If you do all familiar, you tend to lose the more avid theater-goer who wants a variety. However, if you only do new theater, you might lose people who are infrequent theater-goers who have to choose how to spend their money.
It’s a careful balance. I know we used to have a subscription to Arena, but the year that they did 7 of 7 African American plays, it was too much for us and we decided that that was the one of our subscriptions that we would have to let go. This coming season, Signature (our favorite theater in the metro area) is doing 5 new features. Due to having to balance costs, we’ve decided that we will not subscribe, but will go to select shows on the roster. Signature is a little too pricey and for us, we decided that we’ll only do 3 or 4 of the shows and not all 5. I know that we’re not alone in the way that we view theater. I think that when competing for entertainment participation, theaters have to mix up what they do and make sure that they keep some new and some familiar in their mix to keep subscribers coming back.
Diane C., I and several others offered ideas above about how to get kids in the theater. I hope you and others have read these.
Just another plug for the vibrant YOUTH in our community who are actively engaged in Theatre…
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2008 National Capital Area CAPPIE Nominees just announced!
if you think attendance is declining now,wait one year.this will drop by 400,000. as they say,it’s money,stupid.critics are more concerned with their own jobs but their over intellectualized reviews will keep killing the theatre.lower prices. eliminate critics.have people who attend give their published opinions.of course,this will not happen and theatre will diminish….also for plays the audinece is upper middle class. this segment of the population has1.7 children.most children born now will rarely if ever enter a theatre as an adult.
To those theatregoers that are ending their subscription at big theatres, due to the cost….may I suggest investing in some of D.C.’s fine non-equity houses? There are plenty of good, small theatres offering quality work, for a price at and around $15-20 per ticket. Affordable and accessible work, and daring work, too.
Longacre Lea, Rorschach, Forum, Catalyst, Constellation, Solas Nua, Journeymen. These are quality theaters producing quality work.
Hi all. Some great comments and suggestions. I am on a theater board for a local high school in a small town in the Midwest that is asking the same question about putting butts in the seats. Interestingly, we have a new 350 seat theater in town that is part of a huge restaurant complex ad it does quite well with the older, Christian segment but there’s not much else offered there.
You all have given me some great information to ponder and bring for discussion to the board.
It seems clear that a dominant thought is that their is limited involvement of younger people in theater. My experiences are not different at the high school level which is somewhat alarming when students done attend the plays and musicals in their own school (no football team at this school either! hmmmm).
Thanks for the insights and comments. BTW, what’s Ronnie all ticked off about? Sounded like he made some great comments along with others. Can’t everyone have a perspective.
Thanks again. Peace
Just wondering what the fine folks at Helen Hayes, dcthetrescene and interested theatres are still pondering. This topic just died. And it seems of nothing changed. Somewhat of a waste of talented collective thought.