Los Angeles demands lower wages!
You're the best!
You may have thought that all the "Best Of" lists were done after the end of the year, but you were wrong! City Pages is out with its annual Best of the Twin Cities, and there are a bunch of theater people on there. Congratulations to everyone who's now The Best, especially to those of you who became The Best by working on the many small stages in town.
Also, there's still time to participate in something else that's always The Best in my heart: the May Day Parade! In the Heart of the Beast is getting its annual paper mache pageant ready, and they need your help! Go on. Dare to be the best paper-based representation of the coming of spring and/or resistance to something about capitalism you can be!
Union! Union! Union?
Speaking of capitalism, 96 years ago, the brand-new labor union for actors staged its first strike and shut down Broadway. The drama had all the hallmarks of a classic union uprising: workers paid next to nothing for long, grueling work weeks; wealthy employers who attempted all sorts of legal shenanigans to shut down the union before it could get organized; tense standoffs; deep-seated grudges; and, finally, triumph of the working man over the tyranny of the employers. Out of it, the Actor's Equity Association was born.
Great stuff, but, oh my, what a difference 96 years makes.
You've probably heard about the AEA's proposal to modify the infamous 99-seat plan in Los Angeles, which currently lets small houses pay union actors next to nothing for their work. A typical union in a typical profession would never let such a situation exist, but theater is no typical profession, so we were treated to the surreal scene of actors picketing their own union headquarters for the right to not be paid a living wage.
For my own particular reasons, I am not a member of AEA, nor have I ever pursued becoming a member. However, while I was growing up, my father was a member of an industrial union, so I got to see firsthand just how effective a union could be in fighting for its members' interests. Without the historical actions of workers' unions in the United States, we would never have all the protections for workers' rights that we have today.
But, the theater world is a little nutty. Despite AEA's best attempts to spin its proposed changes to LA's plan as being good for its members' wages, Equity actors in LA voted nearly two to one against changing the plan. That is, they voted against themselves getting a minimum wage. Granted, only about 44% of eligible members actually showed up to vote—not voting is a proud American tradition, after all—but the lopsided vote caused the advisory committee tasked with shepherding the change through to ask AEA to delay making a decision.
If you're reading this week's News and Notes hot off the presses, then today, April 21, is the very day that AEA promised to make its decision on changing the 99-seat plan. The vote mentioned above was merely an advisory vote, meaning that AEA can still do whatever it pleases, regardless of how its members voted. Democracy!
I hope everyone appreciates that this is one of the weirdest situations in the history of workers unions since the day someone said, "Hey, where'd Jimmy go?. We ostensibly have a situation where a union has a choice between representing its members' financial interests or respecting the opinion of its members, which seems to run counter to their financial interests.
Only in theater, folks. Whatever the decision, it may have a big ripple effect for the rest of the country, as we're all forced to ponder the meaning of a worker's union in which only 41% of its members were actually employed last season.
Writers Gonna Write
Good job, Stephen Adly Guirgis. You just won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama! So, what are going to do now?
According to Wikipedia, "Guirgis is writing a screenplay based on the life of six-time world champion boxer Emile Griffith for Scott Rudin Productions" and "Guirgis is currently collaborating with Academy Award nominated director Baz Luhrmann on a Netflix Series about the birth of hip-hop in the 1970s."
Oh… so no new big plays in the works?
It's OK. Playwrights don't make a living writing plays anymore. No less than Tony Kushner said so in an interview: "I make my living now as a screenwriter! Which I’m surprised and horrified to find myself saying, but I don’t think I can support myself as a playwright at this point. I don’t think anybody does."
But it's cool! (Even if Tom Stoppard thinks this is a "frightening time for free speech") Tony and his fellow NYC-based playwrights don't even have to ship out to Hollywood anymore to make a living writing screenplays.
There have been a number of articles floating around the aether lately talking about the trend of playwrights making a living as screenwriters, which leads me to wonder: at what point does a playwright have to admit that he or she is no longer really a playwright? It might be more apt to say that Tony Kushner and his ilk are screenwriters that occasionally write plays. Of course, by that logic, I will be forced to admit that I am really a carpenter who occasionally acts in a play.
There's nothing wrong with being a carpenter, (Am I right, Jesus?) but it's incredibly hard to give up an artistic identity, even when it's kind of given you up. For a more nuanced and honest approach to this subject, you should probably jump over to American Theatre Magazine and see J. Holtham wrestle with this issue in his article, "If You Are What You Do, I Guess I’m Not a Playwright Anymore".
What's a Joe to do?
Joseph Haj hasn't even gotten to Day One of his glorious new regime at the Guthrie, and already everyone's telling him what he should do. In a recent Star-Tribune article, Rohan Preston went around asking folks what they think the new Joe should do with the big blue box on the river. Wendy Knox wins the comedy award for saying, "Blow the building up, actually," and while I would love to see Haj begin his tenure by standing astride a smoking pile of concrete and blue-tinted aluminum and announcing that the revolution has begun, I'm pretty sure he's going to keep the dynamite locked up for now.
The list of proposals outlined in the article mostly serves to outline the incredibly difficult job that Haj will be coming into. The number of interests and people to please is endless, and I'm sure he'll have no end of headaches as he hears complaining about just about anything he does or doesn't do in his time in office. I'm sorry, Joe. It's the nature of the beast. I just want to warn you that the Strib is actively seeking suggestions from the public on this question, so the list of unreasonable demands will grow even further. Good luck.
Around the country, there are plenty of Joe-level changes going on, and they're always hard; but, in the end, we might be better off for them. Remember last year when we talked about San Jose Rep going under? It was the first of several LORT houses to run aground last year, but there's a deal in the works to bring the building back to life as a theater again, as either the home to an actual resident theater company or as an extension of San Jose State's performance program. Either way, it would be a vastly different model from the standard stodgy old regional theater that used to be there.
Over in New York, the littlest official Broadway space, the Helen Hayes Theater, was finally sold ending a confusing and long legal battle between the buyer and seller. Second Stage, the nonprofit off-Broadway theater that bought the Helen Hayes, has an ambitious plan to bring a more diverse selection of modern playwrights to Broadway, which is sorely needed (and which will hopefully make some of those screenwriters who dabble in plays happy).
In Philadelphia, there's a big to-do about a new theater space that will be shared by five different small resident companies. (Shades of ARTshare, anyone?)
And then there's a new deal with Rolin Jones (who you might know from his work on Weeds, Friday Night Lights and Boardwalk Empire). Jones just inked a deal with 20th Century Fox Television to create a new production company that will develop both new TV shows and new plays. Instead of fighting against television, Jones has decided to sidle up to it and slide some money out of its pockets.
Anyway, what I'm trying to say, Joe, is that there are a lot of interesting ideas for shaking up old systems out there. However, if you do feel like strapping strategically-placed packets of demolition-grade C4 to the key supporting structures of the Endless Bridge, let me know. I want to see that.
