a poor player

Dunkirk NY – Before I get too far into this post, I am going to let you look at this particular graphic for a bit. Take your time with it.

source: The NY Innovative Theatre Fund Demographic Survey of OOB Practitioners

Notice anything interesting about it? I thought the most interesting aspect of this graphic was the fact that, while 77% of OOB theatre practitioners are white, only 45% of the population of New York City is white. And just as striking are the figures below it: while 27% of NYC’s population is Black/African American, only 5% of OOB theatre people are Black/African American. Although not in this graphic, the numbers for the Hispanic community mirror those of the African American numbers.

Something else from the NY Innovative Theatre Fund survey was interesting to me as well (this data is not, by the way, a part of the published study. I asked for the additional breakdown). It’s the fact that 32% of OOB theatre practitioners come from the tri-state region of NY (24%), NJ (6%) and CT (2%). The data does not give us where in the state those people come from, so we don’t know exactly what their proximity to NYC is, but regardless, what it also means is that 68% of all OOB practitioners originally came from outside the NYC metropolitan region (actually, the percentage is probably higher, because while the data says that 24% of them are from NY state, it does not say how many of those 24% are native to the five boroughs or Westchester/Rockland/Nassau counties). But once they get to New York, they live in the city. 93% live in NY State, while 91% live in one of the five boroughs. In terms of borough breakdown, it’s 52% Manhattan, 30% Brooklyn, 16% Queens, and the rest of the remaining 2% split between the Bronx and Staten Island.

If you connect the dots, a pattern appears which could be considered…well, controversial. It seems as if white people, about 2 out of 3 of whom were born outside the metropolitan area, have migrated to NYC and created a theatrical ghetto, producing theatre primarily for white people while being surrounded primarily by non-whites. In other words, in a city where people of color are in the majority, the theatre being produced appears primarily to be for the minority whites. Continue reading ‘The Indie Theatre Ghetto’ »

Dunkirk NY – I got this from Scott’s blog, but rather than link to it, I thought it was worthy of being posted right here. Ben Cameron is the Program Director for the Arts at the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and former Theatre Communications Group director, and in this talk he speaks about the future of the arts that points the way towards a more de-centralized and participatory model. It’s passionate and, interestingly enough, it uses the same analogy I used concerning the effect that the Protestant Reformation had on “de-Catholicizing” the western Europe mindset of the day.

Dunkirk NY – Poor Scott. I seem to get him into a lot of trouble unknowingly. I write what I think is an innocuous post, catching my feelings of the moment; Scott expands upon it because it moves him to think and consider; and the next thing you know – theatrospherical shitstorm! I wouldn’t blame him if the first thing he does when he sees me at the SETC Conference is beat the crap out of me for getting him into so much verbal trouble.

So, to some extent, I feel a bit compelled to come to his rescue and pull out from his post something I think is important to both of us, and why we collaborate in terms of trying to change the face of theatre education. Here is what I’d like to focus on from his most recent apologia:

My desire to increase geographical diversity has never been about rejecting the small theatres struggling to carve out a niche in New York or Chicago or Los Angeles. Many of those theatre are very much a part of their community — I think of a theatre like, say The Classical Theatre of Harlem in this regard. My beef, to borrow Don’s terminology, is the message that theatre people can only have a “serious” career if they are in Nylachi; that theatre in Nylachi is the only theatre worth considering; that there is a geographical hierarchy with Broadway at the top (which has been recognized as a dumb idea for decades now); that “quality” and “excellence” has a geographical component. This is nothing short of an ideology, one that is oft repeated by those who have bully pulpits for the art form such as Michael Kaiser and Rocco Landesman, and that gets passed down to high schoolers across the nation through TV broadcasts of the Tony Awards and TV shows like “Taking the Stage” and “Grease: You’re the One That I Want” and “Fame” that are little more than extended advertisements for the Broadway and commodity-arts ideology.

Continue reading ‘A Mindset is a Terrible Thing to Face’ »

Dunkirk NY – There is really no other way to put it than this: I’m bored. De-motivated. Struggling to find some reason to move forward.

Perhaps it’s the winter. Perhaps my SAD is not fully under control. Perhaps I am not eating enough chocolate or getting enough exercise or drinking enough. Perhaps I am tired of looking at all my windows and realizing they are shut tight. Perhaps the lack of a full-functioning bathroom and having to shower in the basement for the last four weeks while waiting for the re-modeling to be finished is taking a toll. Perhaps it’s realizing I can’t find a pair of underwear without holes in it. I dislike shopping for clothes as it is. Continue reading ‘Battling Ennui’ »

Dunkirk NY – The Denver Theatre Center has apparently decided to close its MFA Conservatory. The move was cited as a way to cut costs. Auditions that had been scheduled for the incoming fall 2010 class have been canceled. No announcement to this effect has yet been posted to its website, although the website does say that the deadline to apply has passed and all audition dates have passed.

The Denver Theatre Center Conservatory was one of the few places where all the MFA students attended at no charge and also received a stipend, costing the theatre about $100,000 per student in scholarships.

The Denver Post story is here.  -twl

Fredonia NY – They tell me that, when you are busy or in a dry spell on your blog, you have to keep it active somehow, and one of the best ways to do that is just refer your readers to other stuff to read. So OK then: Read this. And read this. And, because I believe in the rule of three, read this (as well as the rest of the series.)  -twl

Dunkirk NY – This is interesting. Perhaps Rocco is not so deaf after all. Money graph:

(Landesman) has just announced a new initiative that should alleviate the fear that this Yale School of Drama grad wants to give money only to fancy Manhattanites.

The just-announced Our Town program will use small, targeted grants to help arts organizations revitalize their communities. It draws on research showing that investments focused narrowly at the neighborhood level can produce social ties and a healthier local economy. In next year’s budget request, the agency asks for $5 million to start work in 35 or so locations around the country: developing arts districts, sponsoring festivals, and commissioning murals and sculptures. This ground-up, community-building approach seems like an arts-world translation of some distinctly Obama-ish values.

(h/t Community Arts Network API News)

Dunkirk NY – As a teacher of actors and acting, I always try to have an eye out for any information or statistics that will give my students a greater picture of what’s in store for them upon graduation. I do not like them to think about their careers in a vacuum, nor do I like to feed them myths or illusions about their chosen profession. Since I am of the firm belief that many theatre departments nationwide are training their students without regard for the realities of the profession and the changes that have occurred over the past 30 years, the more data I can accumulate to make my case, the better. Theatre education in this country needs change at every level, and it needs to change not only because we want to produce higher-quality theatre across a wider swath of this country, but because we need to provide career options beyond the standard “pre-professional training” model which is focused almost exclusively on finding success in the NYLACHI scene.

The indie scene has seen a great rise in visibility over the past five years or so, due primarily I believe to the rise of the internet, theatrical blogging, and the web presence of such sites as TimeOut NY and TheatreMania. I think it’s also becoming the place where most graduating seniors bent on heading to NYC to begin their rise to fame and fortune find their first taste of doing theatre in NYC. As such, it bears significant study and observation.

Continue reading ‘The Indie Actor’ »

Fredonia NY – A man came to my door early this morning as I was having my breakfast. I don’t usually get early morning visitors, so I was taken a bit by surprise. I went to the door and saw it was a man with a shovel in his hand, wanting to clear my sidewalk and driveway of the inch or so of snow that had fallen since early morning.

I have a snow thrower. It cost about $550. My plan, as usual, was to run the snowthrower later this afternoon after all the snow had fallen. I pointed this out to the man. With a weak grin on his face, he said to me, “I see that,” and he waited.

He was perhaps in his mid-30s. His coat was worn but serviceable for the weather. His shovel was ancient, curled up at the very end. Nothing about him indicated he was homeless, an addict, or any sort of substance abuser. He seemed to be a man eager to work, but out of work. He was polite, softspoken, but behind his eyes was a look of need. We negotiated terms – $10 for the sidewalk and the driveway from the back of the car to the street. He went quickly to work.

The snow was not deep, so the work took little time; 15 minutes at most. I finished my breakfast. When he was done he came to the door, took the money, said thanks with a smile, and left, presumably on to find another sidewalk to shovel.

I remember when kids used to come around to do this job. They don’t anymore. Now it’s unemployed men. Maybe I paid for his breakfast, or for the one meal he would have today. Maybe I paid for his kid’s dinner. Maybe I made a contribution towards his rent. And maybe I paid for a six-pack. I didn’t ask. I didn’t care.

I presume I will see him for the rest of the winter when it snows. I presume I will still use the machine later tonight as the snow continues to pile up the rest of the day. Or maybe he will return later this evening for round 2. I have a feeling that I may be using my machine a bit less over the next few months. That’s all right with me.

There’s a play here to be written. It’s the story of two men: one with, and one without, who meet on a chance encounter. For one, the stakes are low; for the other, high. The snow is the catalyst that brings them together. They negotiate a re-distribution of wealth, of means. Where will this lead both of them? If you’re a playwright reading this blog, why not give it a shot?  -twl

Dunkirk NY – This evening, as I returned home from a disappointing meeting of my University Senate, during which a decision was made to continue discussing the issue of creating a College of Fine and Performing Arts, I happened to be listening in to the American Public Media show Marketplace. One of the segments on the show happened to be about a research study done on the topic of people’s perceptions of wealth distribution in this country. Here are the key points of the study:

• 20% of the nation’s population own 85% of its wealth (pre-recession figures).
• People polled in the research study underestimated how much of the wealth of this nation the 20% owned. They believed that 20% of the nation’s population owned only 68% of its wealth.
• When they were asked what they thought would be an equitable amount of wealth for this 20% to own, they said 33%. This figure cut across the political spectrum; Democrats and Republicans alike thought 20% of the population owning 33% of its wealth was OK. Continue reading ‘Theatrical Wealth’ »