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Come Early And Watch

by:

Joe Patti

I really love watching productions come together. Last night I was watching a dress rehearsal for a show we are opening on Friday. I always do so around this time so I can spot any audience related concerns that didn’t occur to anyone to tell me. I usually watch for things like strobe use, characters entering from the audience that will necessitate holding late seating or people returning from restrooms. I also keep an eye out for things that might offend audiences despite assurances that there is nothing offensive in the show. (Yeah, right)

I give feedback on the production. I don’t engage in any of the meddling for which producers are stereotypically infamous. Generally I just talk about things that confused me because of costuming, point out some overacting that went on while the director was looking elsewhere or note that people were bumping the scrim during backstage crossovers.

A recent development I have been pleased to see is the migration of staging techniques from our smaller experimental Lab Theatre space to our Mainstage. In that space activity begins as people are being seated prior to the performance, segues in the performance proper and through the intermission. What I have liked is that the action has been appropriate for the performance and has engaged the audience’s interest. Seats are filled well before the show begins so there is no need to chase people in from the lobby or wait while stragglers pick up tickets.

Beyond guaranteeing order and promptness, I appreciate that this is a step away from the pattern of arrive, sit quietly during the show, leave. People can talk during the pre-show and intermission or watch as they please. It also gives the performers an opportunity to create something original within the bounds of the production circumstances. They can develop their character a little more. Infrequently seen characters can get a little more performance time.

My hope is that something more evolves out of it and takes theatre to the next stage in engaging the audience. My fear is that the practice will move from appropriate to gratuitous as people decide it is a cool thing to do and attempt to include it in every performance. Not only will it be ill considered artistically, but it can also halt the evolution I hope for if people get stuck in the rut.

The mainstage production we are opening doesn’t actually incorporate original work but rather uses a song from the script as a musical interlude during the intermission to lead back into the show. One consideration in attempting what I have described here is that inclusion of original work before and in the middle of a performance may run counter to the intent of the creator and invalidate your performance license. You may also run into copyright infringement. Our Lab space has done out of copyright works or added the action with the approval (and some times participation) of the playwright.

None of things mean it is a bad idea. I am sure this not a unique idea and other theatres regularly use these techniques. In fact, I am pretty sure at best it may be a new take on a very old idea.

Audience Relations

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Bullets and Hooks For The Arts!

by:

Joe Patti

Amid all the press about the Obama victory last week and the extremely slim margin of votes separating Norm Coleman and Al Franken in Minnesota, you may have missed the news that Minnesotans passed a constitutional amendment to increase the sales tax 3/8 of 1% to fund the cleaning and maintenance of Minnesotan lakes, parks and wildlife areas and to fund the arts.

Arts Go Fishing And Catch Some Money
You may be wondering, as I was, how the arts and culture became a part of the Clean Water, Land and Legacy Amendment. According to a couple sources, sport fishermen and hunters found a common cause with the arts. On the Pioneer Press website, Chris Niskanen writes (my emphasis)

“A small part of the general fund (about $10 million) goes toward arts funding (out of the state’s $34 billion budget), but about one-third was cut during the state’s budget crisis in 2003. The hunting and fishing community at first opposed arts being added to the amendment, but saw arts supporters had similar arguments for funding. The alliance ultimately helped the amendment pass the Legislature and, perhaps, will help it pass on Nov. 4.”


Bait Your Hook With A Powerful Lure-Arts and Culture

But the quote I really liked came from an article Artsjournal.com linked to in which columnist Jay Weiner writes,

“As it was, the pioneers of the amendment idea — the sportsmen with bullets and hooks — were wary enough of the arts being included … until they saw the political power of the statewide arts and cultural organizations.”

My first thought upon reading this was that if this is true, the Minnesota arts community should be the envy of the rest of the country. Every state should be lucky enough to have an arts community with enough political clout to help get a constitutional amendment passed. Of course, that influence didn’t magically appear, the state arts community would have been working on cultivating it over the course of years and probably decades.

If you have any ambition of trying something like this in your state, read Niskanen’s piece which addresses the arguments for and against the amendment.

You may also want to read Weiner’s article which addresses the apparently mocking suggestion that the Minnesota Vikings should have gotten on board the amendment so they could get a stadium. Weiner points out first that as fervent as sports fans in Minnesota are, they never seem to rally behind their teams politically. The other thing he mentions is that berating the arts and parks people perpetuates an environment which keeps sports fans from forming coalitions. Some interesting thoughts on the whole from a sports writer.

Leadership, State of the Arts

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Work For Obama? Yes, You Can!

by:

Joe Patti

Get Your Plum
The presidential transition team has set up a website at Change.gov where you can actually apply for a non-career position with the new government. There is a link to the transition directory in the lower right hand corner to give you an idea of what to expect if you apply. Even though it is a similar color, it apparently is not the famed Plum Book though you probably can use it to get a sense of the general department for which you may want to work.

I mention this in hopes some passionate people interested in government service will step forward for the NEA, NEH and other cultural and educational departments. There is certainly a need for competent people to enter public service. A foundation endowing the Wilson School at Princeton University is suing the school for not preparing enough people to enter government.

What You Should Really Look At
Even if you have no ambition to work for the government, you may want to contribute at the American Moment: Share Your Vision link. I am sure there are a lot of people with millions of ideas who will contribute via this page and anything we send may get lost in the crush. Still there is a better chance of something happening than if nothing is said.

The page provides the ability to upload a photo or video. My immediate thought was that if someone knows of a great program out there they should create a well written document supported by images and video. Share your vision for an arts education program based on something that works in at a school district in Montana. Talk about the way the local government partnered with industry to lead community investment in that arts center overlooking Lake Erie. Tell them about your idea for changing the tax code to provide arts organizations with other alternatives to the 501 (c) (3) structure. I had no intent of submitting anything myself, but now as I write, I begin to have some ideas.

State of the Arts, Terms and Ideas

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Fake Violence Can Still Be Traumatic

by:

Joe Patti

Via Artsjournal.com is an interesting article on how actors deal with inflicting violence on one another. Even though it is simulated, the very personal, brutal actions the performers replicate can have a psychological impact on them.

Acting Comes Between Us
I have been involved with two productions of Extremities, a play in which a woman is attacked in her home by a man intent on raping her. She gains control of the situation and takes her revenge on him. The actors get physically close to enacting the rape and when the tables are turned, the would be rapist is half blinded, tied up in a fireplace with his intended victim threatening to burn him. In both productions I have been associated with the two primary actors had to take showers afterward to cleanse themselves of the psychic and emotional baggage of the show. People who were close friends found an uneasiness crept into their relationships during the production. They had to reassure and reconnect with each other after every performance to essentially ground themselves.

I know much of this because rape as a subject matter lent itself to many outreach and audience talk back sessions. On one production one of my responsibilities was to make extra sure that family and friends didn’t make their way backstage before the actors had an opportunity to reoriented themselves.

Hopefully No Wrong Ideas About Method Acting
As far as I know, no one went out and engaged in violent behavior in order to prepare for the performance. I think what disturbed each person so much wasn’t that they had so much simulated violence directed at them as that they found something to tap into within themselves to fabricate a credible portrayal. Knowing that the potential for that sort of thing exists within you and your friends can be pretty unsettling.

Coping Mechanisms for Violent Acting
As I read the NY Times article about how the how London actors insulated themselves from their actions, I wondered if that sort of strategy was widely used by actors. It certainly didn’t seem that way with the highly charged productions I have been involved in. I also wondered if theatres who produce these types of shows make alterations to their normal practices and give the performers extra time and dedicated spaces to wind down after performances.

I would be interested in hearing about other people’s experiences either in the comments section or by email.

General Musings

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Butts In The Seats by Joe Patti is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.
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