American theatre

Time was when the brightest lights of the American stage gleamed only on Broadway, New York City's legendary theatre district where all new plays were born and nurtured, where stars were made, where the best theatrical talent in the country vied for the chance to have their visions and their names lighting up "the Great White Way".

But in the short period, of a few decades all that has changed. A fundamental transformation has overwhelmed, the once-staid Broad-way scene, as a vast and remarkable, network of professional regional theatres has sprouted up across the nation and begun to flex its collective artistic muscle. Few would, deny that Broadway remains the prima donna of the American theatrical experience, a powerful magnet for the country's finest performers. Yet in terms of creativity,' productivity, and originality, Broadway presently is no more than a first among equals as the upstart regionals have transformed, themselves into the crucible in which virtually all new work for the American stage is being molded. Now these theatres have slowly but surely challenged the: might and main of Broad-way by regularly sending the best of their seasons to New York. Examples abound:

- Go west to the Seattle Repertory Theatre and you might witness the world premiere of an Important American play. In 1988 the Seattle Rep presented Wendy Wasserstein's The Heidi Chronicles, a play about a woman's rites of passage in the modern world. It moved on to New York and won both the pulitzer prize and the Tony Award for the best play of the season.

-Go southwest to Texas to the Alley Theatre in Houston and you may see something as unexpected as a guest group from the State Theatre of Vilnius, Lithuania, presenting a production of Anton Chekhov's Uncle Vanya. Similarly, the Alley Theatre has exported its own production of William Gibson's The Miracle Worker' to 17 cities in the United States and Canada.

- Go south to Sarasota, Florida, to the Asolo Theatre and catch Terrence McNalley's Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune or enjoy a revival of that perennial favourite Cyrano De Bergerac. Watch for the opening of their new facility, an authentic Scottish playhouse rebuilt and reborn on Florida soil, but equipped with the latest in stage and lighting equipment.

- Take a short trip from New York to the Hartford (Connecticut) Stage Company and see a production of the newly translated Pear Gynt by Henrik Ibsen, a play that Broadway hardly ever has a chance to do. Or wait for the premiere of a new American play, like Jerry Stemer's Other people's Money, a wry comedy on big and little wheels in the American stock market that has since taken up residence Off Broadway and promises to be in for a very long run.

- In Los Amgeles, California, at the Mark Taper Forum you might see American premieres of plays from other countries, part of that theatre’s ongoing program of international productions. Playing recently was the Mystery of the Rose Bouquet by an Argentinian writer, Manuel Puig.

This is just a small sampling of what is happening at all points of the compass around the United States, and it explains with mute eloquence why Broadway no longer can lay claim to being the heart of American theatre. This decentralization from the primary New York arena to a galaxy of outlying stages is a turnaround, of such profound proportions that it almost defies comprehension. Just 25 years ago, fledging regional theatres depended entirely on tried and true Broadway-produced shows and a smattering of classics to round out their repertory seasons. Few regionals had either the audacity or the resources to produce a new play or introduce the work of a new playwright. This was purely the province of New York.

Now just the opposite is true. An influx of financial support from a variety of sources – the Ford Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, local corporations, private patrons, and ticket sales to a widely expanded, audience – has infused the regional theatres with a vitality that has transformed them into the engine that drives America’s creative theatrical machinery. This shift has had a deep and reverberating impact not only on the process of taking a play from script to stage, but on the demographics of American theatre life – everything from hiring patterns, production opportunities, training methods, and perhaps most important, a broadly expanded market-place for writers, actors, directors, and technicians.

The regionals are now a powerhouse of theatrical activity. They have brought live theatre to millions. They have planned to include children and the elderly. They have included local citizens on their boards to give a sense of community involvement. They have lured young talent by offering a decent wage and a chance to grow artistically. They have attracted seasoned professionals by providing opportunities to experiment and do something different. They have brought stagecraft and lightning to new heights in modern well-equipped playhouses.

The regionals now employ more theatrical professionals than Broadway and Off Broadway combined. Broadway, on the other hand, has become dominated by stunningly lavish, highly technical, large-cast musicals with proven box-office appeal. Because of the expenses involved in mounting a production in New York and the accompanying financial risks of the commercial theatre, Broadway reasonably enough, is loath to gamble on anything ‘but the most sure-fire hits’. Par better, the reasoning goes, to pluck the most popular plays from regional theatres around the country (or from abroad), with much of fine-tuning and publicity chorea done in advance, and turn them in Broadway spectaculars. And why not? It is proving to be a viable system perhaps even a more natural hierarchy than the exportation of hits from Broadway, and it promises to continue well into the 21st century.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-14