Reactions to How Theater Failed America in Los Angeles

March 24, 2009 by Dennis Baker 

From blog post The Post Show Round Table by Mick Montgomery

I listened to someone from the Odyssey say the words that spell the down fall of all theaters in this country… “I don’t want to do Children’s Theater, I want to do the Art I want to do.”

My message to those folks running theater in this town is… “Guess what? That’s not your job.” The job of the theater is to support it’s audience and community, not exist soley for the purpose of indulging the creative proclivities of the artists entrusted with running the stage. Artistcally, I may want to do a season filled with “True West” and “End Game” and the like, where I could star in or direct them all, but that’s not my job as the steward of the theater. My job is to embrace my community for who they are, and then go from there. I’m not saying this is soley doing Children’s Theater, but it’s about engaging your audience where they are at, not asking the audience to engage you where you are at. Theater is about people, audiences and artists sharing things together. Theater is not about a building or a ‘great space’ or subscriptions. The theater is the product of the people coming to it, not the other way around. We don’t understand that here in Los Angeles.

I found it ironic that Mike Daisey railed against theaters trying to ‘get more money’ to solve all their problems with paying artists in his piece, and then comedically, 10 minutes after the show when he asked his panel, what would you need to make big changes to the theater culture in L.A. the first answer out of someone’s mouth was… “We need more money.”

Filed under: Acting, Los Angeles, Theater/Theatre
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Theater Heals

March 14, 2009 by Carrie Edel Isaacman 

Yesterday I went to a teaching artist observation as part of my class in Special Topics with the Manhattan Theater Club. The company has a playwriting/acting residency where students write on themes from current plays they have seen. I visited a school where the students have very advanced life experiences for their age. Some of the students have been in jail and some have just had really rough lives. The writing that the students produce is so full of feeling. As the teaching artist observed, “They get conflict really fast”. That day a situation came up where in a writing exercise that the students prepared, a scene between two characters on the theme of betrayal, a female student wrote on some serious issues involving suicide. The theme of betrayal came from the recent viewing of the MTC’s production of American Plan. The teaching artist and the two visiting actors handled the situation with such sensitivity. During class, they discussed the scene by asking the female student how serious the character is about the violence? After the students were dismissed the teaching artist, actors and our class instructor discussed the student’s writing and the possible issues behind it. Apparently the teacher had already talked with the student at the end of class and there were further plans to talk with the school about it. At that point I said my goodbyes and thanked the teaching artist. I asked if it would be alright to come back. (Technically in the Special Topics class we visit twice for field observation for each play.) He invited me to visit for the culminating event. I will do this, so that I can see the very rich plays that the kids produce, but also to see how that student that I mentioned is doing.

I left the field observation having felt great concern for the student, but also relieved that she will get the help that she needs. In a way, healing took place through the fact that the girl revealed something that she needed: help. And because she asked for help via the writing she may just get that. In this case Theater may have just saved a life.

Carrie Edel Isaacman is a regular guest blogger who is currently working as an Adjunct Lecturer through CUNY and substitute teaching in the NYC Public Schools while she pursues her MS in Educational Theater at City College. She is also involved in TA 101 with New York State Alliance for Arts in Education.

Filed under: Acting, Educational Theater, Teaching
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Video Excerpt of Mike Daisey’s How Theater Failed America

March 9, 2009 by Dennis Baker 

Filed under: Acting, Graduate School, Theater/Theatre
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