Broadway producer Ken Davenport recently noted that the very first BroadwayCon would occur next year.
Davenport envisioned that many participants would follow the practice of the Comic Book Conventions and dress as their favorite Broadway characters.
They’re planning on roundtables, master classes, autograph sessions and a whole lot more. And please tell me that people are going to dress up like their favorite Broadway characters. I’m dying to see a convention center filled with Mormons, Elphabas and a bunch of giant Pumbaas.
[…]
It’s going to be a great opportunity for fans to come together in person (instead of in a chat room – imagine that, actual offline communication) and share their love of all things Broadway.
And it’s going to be a great opportunity for shows to market to those fans, because they’ll be in one specific place.
BroadwayCon is still in the early planning stages so many of the speakers and other activities haven’t been publicized. I was encouraged to see that they anticipate a younger crowd since they require that anyone under the age of 18 must attend with a registered parent or have a notarized permission form.
This all sounds like a lot of fun and will help people connect more closely with the performing arts.
However, I did notice something that was somewhat disappointing. BroadwayCon is happening in January, right around the same time as two other major performing arts conferences.
The International Society of the Performing Arts (ISPA) is meeting January 12-14. Association of Performing Arts Presenters (APAP) is meeting January 15-19. Three days later, in the exact same hotel as the APAP conference, BroadwayCon is meeting -January 22-24. (This being BroadwayCon it should go without saying it is held in NYC)
Being the first year for BroadwayCon I wouldn’t really expect them to plan cooperative efforts with other conferences. It is just that having them scheduled so closely seems like there will be missed opportunities.
That said, I will admit to a bias toward ISPA and APAP. Since the scope of the performing arts is so broad, I don’t think either ISPA or APAP will benefit from the increased presence of Broadway show promoters at their conference. APAP is already attended by a number of agents representing Broadway shows and artists.
My ulterior motives are for the people attending BroadwayCon to be exposed to the variety of artists that perform during the earlier conferences. This may certainly still be a possibility even for the upcoming 2016 BroadwayCon.
The Under the Radar Festival often overlaps with ISPA and APAP dates and work with these conferences to offer discounted tickets to attendees.
While some onsite performances associated with the APAP conference are generally closed to the public, the off site ones often tend to be public performances to which conference attendees are invited and have a mix that leans heavily to the general public.
Similar opportunities could be afforded to attendees of BroadwayCon.
Though I suspect the Broadway producers like Ken Davenport will be offering attendees very enticing opportunities of their own so it might be difficult to motivate someone who has traveled to NYC for BroadwayCon to go to a flamenco performance instead.