Just Wrought

Seattle Artists Lose an Unsung Support

When I first came to Seattle in 1990 I had only one decent paying trade to my name: I knew how to clean glass. The problem was I was spoiled. In New York I had worked mostly high-rise residential units and got paid three dollars a window by my boss/friend Patrick Shields who worked next to me and also happened to be an actor/writer himself. In Seattle the only window work I could find was with a large outfit that did commercial properties and offered a flat ten dollars an hour. Instead of a bon vivant, polymath, small business-owner working next to me, I had ex-cons, two-bit bigots and pot-smoking thugs tying my ropes. (Literally.  One guy told me getting high beforehand made him concentrate harder on the knots.) I quit after a week and took a job dishing at a breakfast cafe in Green Lake, but the money from that, barely above minimum wage, just wasn’t enough.

The advice I got at the 1911, the dive-bar de facto headquarters of 90’s Seattle fringe theatre, situated directly across Fourth Avenue from Annex Theatre, was simple: “go to Woods.” Woods and Associates was a small, locally owned temporary and permanent placement service located in the Galland Building downtown. I protested that I had zero office experience. The advice was reiterated: “Go to Woods. They’ll take care of you.  You can even tell them you’re an actor. They like actors.”

“They like actors!?”  What kind of outfit was this?

An outfit, as it turns out, that I would have an ongoing professional relationship with for the next two decades. My fellow Annexers were right.  After my initial interview I was paraded around the office to meet owner Sarah Woods, Sarah’s brother Will, Sarah’s business partner Sam Hunter, plus all the rest of the folks in the placement bullpen.  It didn’t matter that I was an actor or that I had never worked in an office.  I would start out slow and simple, they told me.  First gig: the microfilm department of Northern Life Insurance, where I captured images of old annuities documents on their way to the shredder. To tame the boredom I listened to Rush Limbaugh and KPLU jazz on my Sony Walkman. Aldrich Allen, another Annexer, now dead, worked beside me.  A few years later, when I came back from shooting a movie in Maryland to find my first marriage disintegrating, I needed a job desperately. So Woods put me back at “No Life”, this time in the licensing department. It’s where I got to know William Salyers and began to hatch my plan to write a role that only an actor of his talents could pull off.  A few years later we premiered Tuesday at AHA! Theatre.

As time went on, I even found myself temping  in the Woods office itself. I called these gigs “meta-temping”. I used to love Fridays, not only because Sarah ordered in lunch and a masseuse every week, but also because Woods, unlike any other temp service I knew, paid every week,  on the week.  Many temps came into to pick up their checks personally, giving me a chance to do a quick gossip swap with my fellow show folk, like Chris Jeffries or Josh List.

It is not an exaggeration to say Woods was a big part of why my wife and I came back to Seattle from New York City after 9/11.  Temp work in Manhattan had completely dried up.  My unemployment was running out and I had literally no idea how I was going to support our new-born baby boy.  I was certain, however, that if we went back to Seattle, Woods would find work for either Heather or me, so that the other could stay home with the baby.  As it turned out, Heather landed the more lucrative gig—she always could stand working for lawyers more than me.  On nice days I would roll my son in his stroller downtown from Capitol Hill and often visit the folks at Woods after having lunch with Heather.  Bottom line:  after a very tough year, Woods gave us options in another city where theatre thrived.

Woods and Associates will be closing their offices for good today.  When I spoke with Sarah yesterday she sounded upbeat: “I don’t regret the decision at all, but it I’m the one making it so I understand it’s hard for others.”  I nearly choked up when I told her what Woods had meant to me and my family over the years.  “That’s the sad part,” she replied.  “We’ve all been there for each other: the folks that work for us, the client companies.”  Certainly Woods has always been there for me.  No matter how bad a particular day gig might get, I could always think to myself, “Well, I can quit and Woods’ll take care of me: find me something.”  Now, I guess I’m on my own.  My only solace is that I’m not alone in feeling that way.

* * *

So here’s my request.  If you are an artist, theatre or otherwise, and Woods has helped you at some point, please chime in down in the comments section below.  Share a story if you’d like, but chime in, regardless, even with just your name.  I’d love to share a sense of how many creative folks Woods and Associates has helped over the years.

Sandbox Radio – Worth the Wait

 

A bunch of us founded the Sandbox Artists Collective a few years ago “as a place for mid-career artists to explore their craft in the company of their peers.”  Unlike most assemblages of show folk, the Sandboxers weren’t in any hurry to produce publicly as a group.  Most of us were already performing, writing and/or producing professionally elsewhere. We were not, however, completely quiet in our first years, hosting salons, like “Playground” in which four Sandbox playwrights wrote specifically for Sandbox actors.  Finally, however— and fully to the credit of Leslie Law’s leadership— the membership felt the urge to share what happens when we put  our collective mind into putting on a show.  The result was last month’s Sandbox Radio Live, Episode 1, available now in podcast here.

On an individual artist’s note, Sandbox Radio Live has given me the opportunity and motivation to finally flesh out a project I have been percolating since high school.  For all that time, all I knew was that I wanted to wright a nasty noir angel detective saga.  Now you can listen to the first chapter of Markheim on the podcast, with the incomparable Charles Leggett starring in the title role of the reluctant semi-heavenly gumshoe.  Below the fold I am posting the script in case you want to follow along. 

And be sure to attend the next episode of Sandbox Radio Live on Monday, October 10th at West of Lenin, the fabulous new theatre space in Fremont, when Markheim adjusts to life in the strange city of Seattle, and begins his search for the reasons that brought him here.  Special appearance by the fellow that Jesus Christ Himself once called “the Prince of the World.”

Was Mission Creep/Diffusion the Smoking Gun of Seattle Theatre’s Decline?

It all started with me bitching about a Stranger review.  (Come to think of it, that’s how a lot of it starts.)  Now, full disclosure, I actually wrote one of the pieces in Balagan Theatre’s outdoor show King Arthur and the Knights of the Playground, but this ain’t my first rodeo, so I can assure you I’m highly unlikely to complain about a review simply because it’s negative.  (Press is press after all.)  What bugged me was that Goldy began his analysis of the show with a quintessentially flawed premise. 

“If the best children's theater amuses and engages adults as much as children, then Balagan Theatre's world premiere … doesn't make the grade. Still, the kids seemed to love it, and you can't beat the ticket price—free—for the next three weekends in parks around the city.” 

So thusly irked, I posted a link to the piece on Face Book along with the following note: “Ah the old, "children's-theatre-must-also-equally-please-adults"  trope.  How tiresome it truly is.”

In flooded the comments and quickly the discussion drifted, fueled at times by troll-power alone, to the larger question of whether theatres should feel free to stray from their missions in pursuit of general excellence. 

Commenter  “I'm not sure why you're advocating for being "middle of the road" and only pleasing your base. I want theater companies to make great theater.”

Paul Mullin Why would a children's theatre seek to have artistic viability outside of being a children's theatre? That's like asking a GLBT theatre to appeal to straight audiences. It's confounding.

Around and around we went, with narrowly scoped opinions glibly offered as evidence for the larger dismaying trends of Seattle Theatre.

Commenter  You're so niche-y! Every theater wants/needs an audience. Yeah, you go after your core demographic, but it also makes sense to go after OTHER demos as well. …. Consistently ONLY targeting one group is boring and not healthy for a theater, artistically or financially.

Paul Mullin  Can you back this opinion up with any facts? Because it seems to me to be a pretty viable business plan to know your audience and target it…. And I would further maintain that it's exactly when arts orgs seek to please the aesthetic intelligentsia that they start going off the rails.

Commenter  Really? So Intiman/ACT/Seattle Rep should only produce shows that appeal to its supporter base, i.e. 65 year old, upper middle class retirees? Constant revivals of Neil Simon and Vanities and Dancing at Lughnasa? Isnt' that why the big rep houses are dying...they're aging along with the subscriber base?

I was just about to beg off the merry-go-round for good when a long-time friend and colleague leaned in with some extremely crisp and compelling insights.

Rebecca Olson*  This is going to be very shocking, but I actually agree wholeheartedly with Mullin on this one. First, we need to separate the idea that having a clear mission (ie: ensemble generated new work) means doing work that isn’t new/interesting/pushing the box. Having a clear mission is exactly what non-profit organizations are required to do, and what a lot of theaters in Seattle are lacking. What makes a theater excellent is consistently excellent work. Having a clear mission that you stand behind does not make that impossible, and having a broad non-mission (ie: “Our theater is here to make theater,”) does not mandate good work. However, history does seem to be teaching us that having both – a clear mission *and* producing consistently excellent work (ie: Wooden O Theater) creates a lasting organization.

One of the most enlightening conversations I’ve had in my theatrical life was with the late (and very much missed) Melissa Hines, who described how when the Seattle theater scene was young, the “big” theaters (Rep, ACT, Intiman, Empty Space) each had clear missions, and filled specific niches. This is a broad generalization (so please don’t nitpick,) but basically the Rep did modern classics and newish but box office safe shows from Broadway, ACT was slightly more edgy but close to the Rep, filling in the summer season when the Rep was dark, the Intiman did classics, and Empty Space did brand new/quirky/edgy work. Audiences could subscribe to all four theaters and have a completely different experience at each theater; thus, there was no “competition” for audiences.

However, at some point the Rep/ACT/Intiman theaters began spreading out and away from their original mission/focus, and all began to look alike (and the Empty Space closed.) As the big theaters homogenized, it became increasingly clear that moving away from their original missions was not allowing them opportunities to push the envelope and try new things. Instead, it was spreading them thin with too many choices and not enough structure; when one has the opportunity to select from the entire canon, from ancient Greece to modern classics to current new regional hits, to plays not yet written, seasons start to look like a dusty college textbook of “what plays are important for you to know about” rather than an exciting collection of stories for artists and audiences to explore together. 

In addition, this homogenization encouraged audiences to pick one theater and ignore the other theaters; since one season mirrored another, there was no reason to subscribe to all three. This created the climate of competing for an audience.

Finally, it alienated a lot of lifetime theatergoers, who were irritated at being constantly force fed something not to their liking. While some audiences want to see Shakespeare, others want edgy new work, and some want to modern American classics. Audiences began to feel obligated to watch something they didn’t enjoy because it was part of the season they had chosen to subscribe to. Instead of educating and challenging their audiences, over time it simply lost people completely.

Thus the crux of my conversation with Melissa, was that to have organizations that last (which are part of an artistically healthy theatre community,) we need to ask our theaters to figure out what they do that is unique and fantastic, and then ask them to do only that, and do it consistently. For example, I would be disappointed if Strawshop decided to dust off “Guys and Dolls.” On the flip side, it seems natural that 5th Avenue produced “Guys and Dolls” this year –and I would be disappointed if 5th Ave decided to try their hand at “The Laramie Project.” It isn’t that these companies are doing every kind of theater all the time; it’s that they have found their niche, and they are filling it well with consistently interesting, artistically sound productions. If I want to see a good musical, I know where to go. If I want to see productions that are intensely creative and topical, I know where to go.

I am not suggesting an organization become boxed in by a mission that is too confining to allow it to grow, develop and mature over time (ie: Our mission is to produce the plays of Paul Mullin.) I am suggesting that having a mission that is clear but not confining (ie: Our mission is to produce the plays of Northwest playwrights) gives artists/organizations a starting point and framework for choosing their seasons, and gives audiences a clear idea of why they might (or might not) be interested in attending. Missions such as “We want to produce interesting plays that challenge our audiences,” may feel like they allow for more options, but until the statement is so obvious as to be embarrassing (let us all assume that no theater is hoping to product uninteresting plays that bore their audiences), and gives no indication why exactly that organization exists, or what it is offering the community that other theaters are not already offering.

And I am also not suggesting that artists be completely tied to the organizations they primarily work with; if I belonged to a company that produced new plays but I wanted to do an all female version of Hamlet with myself in the title role, I should either pitch the idea to a local classical company or self-produce.  And if the artistic director of a theater who produces classical worked decided that she wanted to direct a production of a new Paul Mullin play, I would encourage her to again, find a company doing new work to pitch the idea to, or self-produce. A non-profit organization’s responsibility is to serve the community – both the artistic community and the audience. If Seattle theatre history has taught us anything, it is that while sometimes fun for the artists who are involved, muddying the water of your organization’s mission and season with random, off point productions is confusing to your audiences and does not serve the organization in the long run.

***

*Rebecca is an actress based in Seattle, performing with theaters throughout the region. She also has worked extensively as a fundraiser for the arts, both on staff and as a consultant to arts groups of all sizes, as well as a volunteer for several arts boards and committees.

Maybe not in Seattle, but “Over There” They Care

 

Ah, the ironies of being playwrights in Seattle: the local Big Houses and mainstream press largely ignore us, and yet the national theatre blogosphere monitors our commentary on unfolding events, especially the Intiman implosion, with the rapt glee of NASCAR fans watching a slow-motion 13 car pile up.

And now, we’ve gone international, as the United Kingdom’s Guardian runs a blog post on our response to the Intiman Board’s somewhat bemusing announcement that they intend to ask the advice of artists on how to proceed.

Making “Nows” from Now Matters Too

Here’s another dirty secret for you: I am as essentially indifferent to theatre as the next 21st century adult.  I like it fine, but if you were to tell me I could never see another production of American Buffalo or Titus Andronicus, I’d find a way to somehow suck it up.  And even though I spent a good part of my youth as an actor, and managed to pay for what little college I got with a performance scholarship; and even though I still really enjoy doing it, if you were to tell me that I had some strange incurable disease, basically benign but which would strike me dead if I ever again strutted and fretted, I’d still somehow find a way to live the rest of my natural days in non-thespian peace.  But I experienced something Sunday that reminded me yet again that there is one aspect of theatre I cannot and will not give up.  So if you tried to tell me I couldn’t write another play for live performance, and I thought you meant it-- well, you and I would have a bit of a war on our hands.

My wife and my boys, ages nine and six, decided late Sunday afternoon to attend the opening performance of Balagan’s Theatre’s 2011 summer outdoor offering, King Arthur and the Knights of the Playground.  It was a perfect Seattle summer day, a rare enough jewel of deep greens and blues.  About a hundred and fifty of us, maybe more, gathered on the rich lawn behind the Asian Art Museum in Volunteer Park beneath some of the most glorious old trees you could ever hope to see.  There were friends, and friends of friends, and friends and family of cast members and crew, and just plain lovers of theatre, young and old; and we all watched some truly sublime goofiness with a wide open heart at its core. I wrote the section—one of five— called “The Ballad of Balin and Balan”, and based my interpretation of these two tragically fated brother-knights on the relationship of my own two sons.  Sitting there on a blanket with my mostly oblivious models, my heart was in my throat from the beginning of the piece, and I was embarrassed to have to wipe my eyes at the corny final scene:

[They both fall to the ground, gasping.]

BALAN:  You know what this means?

BALIN:  We’re gonna die.

BALAN:  Well, yeah, but something else.

BALIN:  Yeah?  What?

BALAN:  The curse said you would kill your best friend.

BALIN:  Yeah.  So what?

BALAN:  So that means I’m your best friend.  Curses can’t lie.

BALIN:   Hey, yeah, that’s right.  And I’m your best friend.

BALAN:  That’s right.

BALIN:  Forever.

It didn’t bother me one bit that my sons were more interested in the toy light sabers wielded by the actors than the fact that I had used their sweet, easy devotion to each other as my inspiration.  I’m pretty sure that if the real Richard III had a chance to see a modern Seattle production of Shakespeare’s play about him, he would be way more fascinated in the costumes, props and actual women on stage than in any resemblance to the biographical facts of his life.  (This is, by the way, another glorious feature of theatre.  We all see something deeply different.)  What blew me away was my own awareness of a profound and magical moment, wherein the very beauty of the earth seemed to host this collection of stories, as sweet and true and fresh as life itself; that my boys were watching grown men attempting to match the matchless nobility of love that children can hold for one another.  And I was part of it.  A very small, perfectly happy part of it.  And because my job was done, all I had to do was breathe and gratefully accept the moment knowing that I can have no idea what experiencing the moment might mean down the road for either of my boys, but suspecting there’s a good chance that it might mean something.

Making plays matters.  Alas, I still have immense difficulty convincing many of my colleagues of this truth.  There’s a director in Seattle whose work I consistently admire who has maintained publicly more than once that he doesn’t believe we need any more new works for the stage because we will never have enough time or resources to produce all of the great plays that have already been written.  Many powerful decision makers in American Theatre agree, most implicitly, but some even explicitly, that the canon of theatrical literature is full: like the Bible, we cannot, should not, and even must not, add volumes to it.  I shake my head and smile at this notion, so apparently provable in the abstract, and yet so falsifiable by one deep blue green gorgeous Sunday afternoon in 
Seattle’s Volunteer Park.

Please forgive the geek metaphor, but if plays are algorithms—timeless software to be run on a particular time’s theatrical hardware (i.e. actors, sets, costumes, props, lighting and sound designs and, yes, even directorial concepts), then I want some of those future algorithms to be from my time.  Put more simply, if plays are “nows” thrown forward into “then”, then I need to believe that some of those “then-nows” will be from this now, if only so my sons’ daughters might know something of how wonderful their fathers were to each other when they were boys.

Intiman Asks Artists for Ideas: Sure Sign of the Apocalypse

Even if I do say so myself, I have been very good about shutting up and keeping shut since promising to do so a few weeks ago.  However, when I ran across Misha Berson’s Seattle Times article “Intiman Interviewing Artists about Company Revival” I simply could not stifle my eagerness to hear what my colleagues in the Seattle theatre scene had to say.  So I posted a link on Face Book and sat back waiting for friends’ responses.  I didn’t have to wait long:

Stephen McCandless Spend less than you take in. Lather. Repeat.

Rik Deskin I want this to work out for them, but I'm a little miffed that they have disregarded my offer to honor Intiman subscriptions at Eclectic Theater Company. The offer was made before they posted the companies currently listed. Oversight? Probably.

Keri Healey It makes me furious that the timeline for this research into the future artistic direction of the theater is framed by the board (at least in this article) as important "if we want to start approaching funders." Right back to the old dependent-on-funders model that got them where they are. Why not rethink that construct, too, as they look at alternatives for operating models? What I wonder about is how the implosions at Intiman and Giant Magnet might change the way local funders look at all arts organizations in the coming years. I suspect the level of trust funders have with arts organizations dropped quite a bit recently.Jim Jewell Keri, you are without doubt right on. We need to develop a different stance, more proactive and self-sufficient and more engaged with the audience, if we are going to win back that trust.

Kasia Patora To be honest, my initial response was the same as to when Hulu asks me to "choose my ad experience": free market research.

Rik Deskin I really believe that Intiman needs to throw out the old book of running a theater and start from scratch, taking insight from ACT, … Jim Jewell and like Stephen McCandless says: don't spend more than you make. Also, like ACT's current model, embrace the wealth of local smaller companies, local theatre artists, and most importanly, embrace your goal of making Seattle a World Class Theatre City, cultivating, investing and developing Seattle's voice. Not New York. Not Chicago. Not Moscow. Seattle!

At this point, Culturebot editor Jeremy M. Barker asks if I’d seen what Isaac Butler had written on his blog Parabasis.  The post was so brief I don’t mind quoting it in its entirety here:  "Intiman is inviting local theatre artists to submit blueprints for reviving the company. My guess is Paul Mullin wasn't invited."

Isaac’s right.  Intiman hasn’t invited me, nor are they likely to.  One can hardly blame an institution for not extending a solicitation of ideas for its survival from someone who publically called for its swift and merciful death; but a larger question remains:  just who are the artists who Intiman plans on polling?  And why wouldn’t a discussion of this nature take place publically?  (Intiman board chair Bruce Bradburn told Misha that “…throughout July there will be individual discussions with artists about their visions for the company's future.”)

Comments kept rolling in:

Scot Augustson I find myself more interest in elves than in Intiman's Future. (And easier to believe in.)

Michael Baker The only way this works is if the artists kidnap the Board à la 9 to 5 and hold them for ransom, while livestreaming it on the web. Also, there should be Dolly covers by Rudinoff.

Mike Rainey I had the impression that the board was more or less the underlying cause for the problems in the first place. It's like a fart asking how we can make this place smell better.

Jeremy M. Barker HA!

Stephen McCandless I maintain that the Intiman doesn't need "new ideas". The management was totally incompetent. To shut down in the fashion they did sternly suggests that their operating principle was "How can we be broke, we still have checks."

Jim Jewell BTW, plans are quickly coming together for convening a community discussion (not so much about Intiman) about what we are doing well, poorly and what we need to do next. A strictly no-bullshit affair that is going to launch new projects, not float suggestions. Keep an eye and ear out.

Stephen McCandless (continuing) They went over budget, spent their reserves, spent their endowment - all over the course of several years. And when their MD leaves suddenly and suspiciously, only then do they cop to a problem - and even then have no idea how large it is until an outside consultant set them straight.  There [was] no one at the wheel. Nobody paying attention. No administration. You can't just let go of the steering wheel and they claim you need "new ideas" about vehicle suspensions. YOU DON'T. YOU NEED A DRIVER.  Who authorized the spend-down of a one-million-dollar endowment and didn't simultaneously raise concerns about the theatre's finances? Who? It took years for this to go wrong. Years. And they act like it's an emergency that reflects on the state of American Theatre. Talk about a sense of entitlement. I might as well try doing a cartwheel and then talk about how the resulting trauma reflects on the state of American Gymnastics and our chances for gold at the next Olympics.

Michael Baker I've been an Intiman booster for years, but I can't fathom this. It actually strikes me as insane--if this "Intiman" (who is that, exactly) were a person, you'd assume heroin addiction. Talking to artists? What about the Intiman subscribers and donors who rallied to support them, only to be told that a) Intiman needs to shut down anyway, and b) they'd spent subscription for next season on debts? How about explaining, in minute detail, exactly how this happened, first. I can only guess that hasn't happened because of how clubby the board is. The subscribers should form a class action and take the Intiman back themselves.

Paul Budraitis The article doesn't say that they're only going to consult with artists and no one else. i understand that financial mismanagement was the root of the problem and that it must be a primary component of their restructuring, but why shouldn't they talk with local artists - ones who the article states have worked previously with the theatre - while in the process of getting back up off the mat? if they hadn't done this, someone would be complaining about the fact that they haven't even bothered to talk to local artists about the future. i say good for them for remembering art while all everyone else wants to do is talk about money.

These are smart people, many of them deeply familiar with the challenges of making theatre both from an artistic and an administrative side.  Most of them take great pains to disagree with me as often and as vociferously as possible.  I don’t know who the Intiman plans on reaching out to for advice, but if their list doesn’t include at least one of the names chiming in above, then I gotta wonder whether the sounding board they say they seek isn’t really just another echo chamber.  I will also be interested to see if Misha Berson and The Seattle Times do any critical follow up on Intiman’s stated plans to include artists’ advice.  Given their track record, very little of what the Intiman’s board says should be taken at face value. 

 

P.S.  Everyone quoted above has indicated to me that they are okay with being quoted.  If by some chance I am mistaken about that, please just let me know and I will remove your quote.  Conversely, if you want to add to discussion, please feel free to comment below.