The Incredible Shrinking Theater Critic and What to Do About It:

New Media and New Approaches to Old Media

By Anne Marie Welsh

In his amusing review of Ronan Noone’s play “The Atheist,” New York Times theater critic, Charles Isherwood, wryly noted that after cajoling his way into the governor’s mansion, the play’s anti-hero, Augustine, blackmails the politician into getting him a journalist’s job at the local paper - benefits and everything.
“I shouldn’t joke,” Isherwood mused, “a full-time reporter’s job in a Midwestern city may soon be a prize rarer than a big lottery win.”

And a theatre critics job, he might have added, rarer still.
It’s no secret that theatre coverage is diminishing at U.S. newspapers. As circulation plummets, advertising revenue plunges and the cost of fuel and newsprint escalate, newspapers cut costs by cutting staff. Layoffs, buyouts, attrition: The ongoing contraction has shrunk not only the payroll but the size of newspapers and therefore the amount of space available for arts coverage.

“Even in New York, though less so at the Times,” says Isherwood, “coverage is slowly getting cutback. Linda Winer’s reviews are much shorter than they used to be; she no longer has a second stringer. She’s a one-man band over at Newsday.”

The Newark Star-Ledger’s veteran theatre critic Michael Sommers recently accepted a buyout offer on a Friday. He wrote six more reviews and features and left five days later with no word on whether he would be replaced. And though the venerable critic, Michael Feingold at the The Village Voice, survived the ax that slashed arts editing and writing positions earlier this year, the publication has narrowed its cultural reach.

“The Times is the notable exception.” Isherwood says, “We still are given space to write long reviews of important shows. I haven’t felt any pressure to shrink my reviews. We cover a huge amount of theatre. We employ three or four subsidiary critics. The truth is, obviously, that our cultural department has shrunk in the last year, but The Times sometimes feels like the last bastion of cultural coverage in the country.”

The most recent six-month circulation figures from the Audit Bureau of Circulations for U.S. newspapers tell one part of this tale: Nationally, the average daily decline in readership was 4.6 percent and Sunday decline was 4.8 percent. Circulation at the Los Angeles Times dropped 5.2 percent daily and 5.1 percent Sunday. The Orange County Register was the biggest loser during the period: its daily circulation plummeted 15.2 percent and Sunday 8.2 percent.

Newspapers are under such fierce financial pressure that cost-cutting measures are announced almost daily. The San Francisco Chronicle offered buyouts to 125 journalists. The Cincinnati Enquirer sought to cut 50. Florida\'s Sarasota Herald-Tribune downsized by a third over two years. So did the San Diego Union Tribune. Newhouse\'s Newark Star-Ledger promised to sell the paper unless the staff was cut by 20 percent; in fact, 45 percent of the staff took buyouts offered this past October.

At the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, longtime critic Christopher Rawson still covers the major shows and a wide swath of a lively scene, but with his freelance budget gone, suburban theatres no longer get reviewed. Rawson also heads the American Theatre Critics Association, an organization whose membership has thinned, buffeted by layoffs and cutbacks.

Often a departing theatre critic’s spot is filled by a freelancer or a general feature writer who then serves double duty, covering more than one art form.

Misha Berson, esteemed long-time theatre critic at the Seattle Times, fears she’s a member of the last generation of full-time professional theatre critics. “I\'m afraid our profession will indeed be a part-time freelance one, as it became at the PI (Seattle Post-Intelligencer) after Joe (Adcock) left,” she says.
“We know we’re going to have another round of buyoffs and layoffs soon,” Berson said of her paper. “I’ve had people at theatre companies I’ve always been objective about, whose work I’ve both praised and panned, begging me not to leave. As a critic outside the Eastern corridor, even though you know you don’t owe the theatres anything, you know how much they depend upon you for media coverage.”

At the San Diego Union-Tribune, an arts staff that not long ago numbered 14 writers has shrunk to five and the family-owned newspaper is for sale.

Even in Chicago, with its expansive and nationally potent theatre scene, coverage is declining. Ben Thiem, director of member services for the League of Chicago Theatres, notes that fewer outlets are covering theatre seriously there. There are also, he says, “Fewer writers in some cases. Fewer reviews in some and fewer words in reviews in others.”

And while some theatre coverage, including reviews, has migrated to newspaper websites or diversified into fan blogs and online theatre sites, reviews by newspaper staff critics still offer “the highest return on investment” to theatres and their audiences, says Eric Shroeder marketing director at Chicago’s Lookingglass Theatre.

“If Chris Jones (at the Chicago Tribune) writes a feature or Hedy Weiss (at Chicago Sun-Times) raves about the show, that still sells tickets. That’s like having a friend who tells tens of thousands of people he’s recommending a show. When that happens on a theatre criticism blog or your friend’s blog which you read constantly, the recommendation will reach maybe a dozen people.”
Newspaper websites extend the reach of critics, but can’t replace their voices. “People reading Chris Jones or Hedy Weiss in print or online still know them to be authorities,” says Schroeder.
But when that kind of authoritative theatre writing becomes diminished, marginalized or absent altogether, what’s a theatre to do?

New Approaches and New Media
Though the answers depend on the size and sophistication of the market, and the degree of artistic competition, a few counterbalancing trends are emerging.

Ellen Fagg, arts and entertainment editor of the Salt Lake Tribune, says many arts organizations have been slow to adapt both to the changing “old media” environment and to New Media possibilities.

“The biggest complaints I hear are from arts groups used to the idea of getting free press. That’s not something I care about. If you have a story to tell me I’m interested,” she says. “The groups who are savvy about that and are driven by a mission, they still get great coverage.”

Fagg says theatre managements have to think harder about telling their story to writers and editors in these days of small staffs, diminished space and no automatic advances.

“Knowing the difference between a story and free press is crucial,” she says. Pitching a good story, preferably with a local emphasis, and supporting it with an arresting image will get her attention.

“Success in getting coverage is still all about dialogue,” says Schroeder, and increasingly about what he calls “transparency.”
“Effective public relations,” he says, “means establishing relationships with the journalist and making it an open dialogue. What do you think of this idea of this play or our concept for this story? The journalist can also let you know what the reaction of their editor might be to that idea. What types of story the editor is looking for.”

Marketing also has to become more transparent, less “cloak and dagger,” says Schroeder. He says he recently responded to a very popular blog item about customer service in Chicago theatres on the Tribune Web site. “Someone had complimented the front of office staff at Lookingglass and I wrote to thank them for thanking us because I know how hard our staff works. I identified myself as the theatre’s marketing director. You have to be upfront about who you are.”

The Internet revolution and corresponding social changes may be killing newspapers but ironically, says Schroeder, theatres are facing the same challenges of reaching audiences in this New Media world as newspapers are in reaching readers.

The Chicago Theatre League’s Theim agrees: “Theatres have definitely been trying to pick up the slack. Many of them are starting to invite more online publications to shows as press, bloggers particularly. But they’re also doing things like enhancing their Web site info to engage patrons with videos, blogs, interviews, podcasts, Myspace, Facebook, etc. Lots of that is going on now.”

Lookingglass and New Victory Theatre in Chicago, La Jolla Playhouse and Actors Theatre of Louisville are among the many theaters with handsome Web sites that offer audiences not just online versions of print material, but real interactivity, with video pages, multiple podcasts, blogs, comments, reader reviews and links to print and mainstream reviews. And in Cincinnati, theatres and the Enquirer have joined forces to reach the same audiences. [see sidebar]

Critic Berson thinks that in a media world that devalues both the arts and serious criticism as a profession, “theatres are going to be under increasing pressure to create their own buzz and word of mouth so they can push past and around the middleman. They’re already using MySpace and Facebook and other networking tools, especially to reach younger audiences. In programming, they have to be strategic about how they spend money and would be making a big mistake to just offer a diet of comfort food to their audiences.”

“It’s a new media world,” says Lookingglass’ Schroeder. “Even print advertising is becoming less and less effective. Theatre people are looking for other ways to be accessible and be in constant communication with audiences through these new media. The whole concept behind Web 1.0 was a one-sided conversation. Lookingglass would put information on our website and a user would look at it. Web 2.0 is all about user-generated content that warrants a response.”

The Lookingglass website has social networking pages on Facebook and MySpace and soon will offer Twitter, the interface between the World Wide Web and mobile devices such as cell phones.
“I may feel that calling cell phones and text messaging subscribers is very invasive, but it’s clear these mobile networks are the communication devices of future audiences,” says Shroeder. “And the Internet world is changing as we speak.”



SIDE BAR

Some New Media Success Stories:

Seek cooperative ventures: In Cincinnati, a downsizing newspaper removed the fences between readers, their theatre coverage and the theatre community. The Cincinnati Enquirer and theatre critic Jackie Demaline teamed with the League of Cincinnati Theatres, the Association of Community Theatres, and other theatre professionals and volunteers to create CinStages. Demaline updates the news blog almost daily and links to her reviews. The site also posts audition notices, features high school theatre, opening and closing dates, performance listings - info useful to audiences and artists alike at http://www.CinStages.com/

Put the regional back in regional theater: Most newspapers are emphasizing local, rather than national stories, a trend that should help live local theatre. Salt Lake Tribune arts editor Ellen Fagg points to Plan-B Theatre, the smallest and newest Equity theatre in her city, as a model for coverage because of its clarity of mission and its commitment to producing work relevant to the region. “They’re producing a whole season of plays by a local playwright, Matthew Ivan Bennett, all based on their faith in this writer.” Next up is his play about a Japanese Internment camp located near Delta, Utah. Last season, Plan-B produced “Exposed” by Mary Dickson, a writer who believes her cancer and her sister’s death by cancer were caused by living downwind of many of the 928 nuclear bombs the U.S. government exploded in the Nevada desert. That show is now touring five Utah cities. “I think our writing communities need to think more about those local connections,” says Fagg. Stories with such local impact written effectively with context and power play very differently in their own communities.

Dialogue with audiences through interactivity: Actors Theatre’s website features an extensive Behind the Scenes section on pyrotechnics, music, costumes, video interviews with audience members, biographies from the playbill, interviews with the director, a blog for audiences to share their thoughts about the show. Such Web info can begin to replace the kind of background or historical or contextualizing feature no longer appearing in a local paper. Other contacts are important, says Schroeder of Lookingglass, whose software allows for follow-up e-mails just after someone has seen a play. “We want to insure that the conversation is open and continuing, so we have a blog. Our Facebook page (1400 friends) facilitates some dialogue, as does our MySpace page (1200 friends).” Theatres can go even farther, he says, citing a graphic design site Crowdspring that has hired a “community relations consultant” who is the organization’s online “persona” spending all day in consistent contact with Crowdspring’s patrons, the ultimate in customer service
Attend to Images to tell your story: Jerry Rapier at Plan-B, an Equity theatre in Salt Lake, recommends his process for getting effective publicity images: “We never take staged production shots - we shoot an entire dress rehearsal without stopping, so that the photos have more power; and we have a world-class artist, Greg Ragland, whom I trust implicitly, that creates our show art. I give him the script; he interprets it with an image. We never change it - we trust him and use whatever he creates. It\'s a strategy that has never failed us - I firmly believe the artistic trust translates impacts the art he gives us.”



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