It popped up in my newsfeed again: another article about an opera/museum/symphony theater company’s new initiatives to attract a “younger audience.” I open these articles with a combination of dread and excitement these days. Maybe this time, this new organization (that spent a couple hundred thousand dollars on a market...
April 2010
In today’s Washington Post, Peter Marks imagines a new hope for theatre with a touch of audacity. (Go ahead and read it. We’ll wait.) The short version is, he considers a world in which the White House could support more live theatre–dramatic work in particular–perhaps coordinated by Rocco Landesman and...
I’m sure they’re clean. I’m sure you’re a good host. I’m sure they’re stocked with ample and appropriate paper products for your anticipated audience, and that the plumbing works. Is that it? A few weeks ago, I wrote how theater lobbies are often functional, neutral spaces—closer in design and function...
If Rocco Landesman claims that artists are entrepreneurs, I think it is important to look at other entrepreneurial models, outside the theater world, to see what they are saying about the work they do, and how their work connects to customers and community. On person I follow pretty closely is...
We price everything backwards in the theater. Tell me if this sounds familiar: You debate with your box office/marketing/artistic staff to find just the right price point that feels “accessible” (read, your friends tell you that this is what “they” will pay to see your work, despite the fact your...
A new street team is working in the area around TKTS in Times Square. They are promoting David Mamet’s new play Race. Race is a story about a group of lawyers who are representing a case in which a man has been accused of raping a woman. Two of the...
This week’s live chat over at TheatreFace.com featured 2amt, among other things… Here’s a transcript in case you missed it or aren’t a member of TheatreFace. (And if you’re not a member, why the heck not? Go on over to TheatreFace and join up. It’s free, it’s a lovely place...
Not just any bookstore, but specifically this bookstore: Montague Bookmill in Montague, Massachusetts. Seth Godin sums it up well when he stated: This is the bookstore of the future, because it’s not a business trying to maximize growth and ROI. No, it’s a place, an attitude, an approach to an...
So there you are, surfing the Twitter streams with your interface of choice–sounds like something out of William Gibson, doesn’t it?–and up comes a tweet from one of the theatre companies you follow. There’s a link in the tweet. You’re curious, so you click on it. The next thing you...
So many live, perishable experiences hang on the decision to leave the house, the decision to take the trouble to go to the venue before the event no longer exists. I remember weighing the $20 cab fare it would cost me to make it to Mandel Hall at the University...
