THE GREAT CONTRACTION

“If I was one to write analytical essays, I would write one about our current time period and call it the great contraction”. Michael Walkup, artistic director of P73

Hold my beer, Michael.

Our industry is shrinking, contracting, pausing and folding in on itself. Audiences have not returned, revenue is down, theaters are pausing artistic development, hedging their bets, laying off 15-20% of their staff, and preparing for the hard times ahead. Gone are the last two years of outward optimism, grinning at donors and pretending it’s going great, putting on a good face for our colleagues, and lying to artists when they ask how it’s going. We are ready to be honest with ourselves and with you - it’s going bad bro. 

But why? How did we get here? 

Perhaps it’s the result of the pandemic. The 18 month pause giving people time to realize that there’s better things to do than watch theater? It’s all Netflix fault! Or perhaps the fear of disease lingers on? Or perhaps our older patrons have passed away?  

Perhaps the industry has lost too many people to other industries?  

Perhaps this is the inevitable result of us paying people fair wages?  Perhaps with inflation and supply chain issues theater is just too expensive to do these days?  Maybe a good solution is cutting down our expensive design budgets into more streamline bare bone productions that move us, even if they don’t awe us with spinning platforms?  

Perhaps there’s always been too much theater out there and this is nature righting itself?   Should we consider consolidating?  Merging three theaters that have similar missions into one?  

And of course if you believe the comments section of the NYtimes, the reason why the theater is suffering is because it’s become too preachy,  too progressive, too brown, too queer, too trans, and too “woke”.  The thought here is that after 2020 the theater changed too much too fast, and  if we only went back to do more traditional work, our finances would right themselves.  

However last but not least, there is the exact opposite theory - the theater world has let itself fall desperately behind the times in terms of form, subject matter, relationship with technology and relationship with audience.  This theory posits that not only did we not change from the pandemic, but we reverted so hard to the past that it has caused everyone, audiences and donors alike, to collectively yawn and look for something more topical.  

It’s probably a combination of all these things, but what we are seeing is theaters having to make tough decisions to survive. The risk averse habits of the American theater now become survival tactics. All musicals and even most plays need commercial theater enhancement to even be produced in the first place - and if you don’t think that influences the type of work being done, you may not understand what commercial theater taste actually is.  Star casting becomes another survival tactic - turning to big names, or traditional and reliable artists, as writer, director or central actor.  The wild thing about risk  averse behavior is that it  also leads to pretty insane decision making if you ask me - we are ok with working with bad characters if they come with money, we turn to revivals that have no bearing on our world because we sure that the  reliable will be profitable, we let commercial producers make decisions for us, we hire people who are not theater artists in the hopes that they can do this better than we have been able to, we over hire the same people over and over again knowing that they can’t concentrate on our project but too terrified to work with someone we don’t already know, we make black artists and artistic leaders jump through more hoops and then offering them consolation prizes when you don’t produce their work.  Innovation is out - survival is in. 

My dear friend and colleague Ben Lasser often speaks to me a lot about the forest of the theater industry burning and the long wait we have ahead of us.  What are we to do while things crumble?  Do your work in the little corners that you can.  Don’t wait for anyone to tell you that you can do something, just figure out a way to do it with or without them. Don’t get jealous about the opportunities that go to others.  It’s hard out there for everyone.  And everyone carries a different weight.  Don’t get mad.  Keep planning.  Keep thinking.  Your ideas will be the things that lead us all forward.  Perfect them.  And once the land recovers, plant them deep into the earth.  “Do your work, then step back; the only path to tranquility”.