Branding Broadway

Warning: I'm not promising to present any new ideas or answers in this post... I'm also no authority on these subjects... I'm just typing some stuff that I'm interested in.

Back when I was in college (a whole week ago) the relationship between marketing and artistry was brought up quite a bit by people in the Arts Marketing class... and although I didn't take the class, I lived with someone who did so I got the cliff notes version and found it interesting.

So today when I found this article in the NY Times I was thrown back to the good 'ole days of flip cup, dancing in basements, and sitting around talking about branding with theatre management extraordinaire Reed Wilkerson. The quote that stood out to me the most in this interview with the New York Times theatre critics Ben Brantley and Charles Isherwood was when they were talking about the celebritization (I made that word up) of Broadway and how the productions that have been monetarily successful on Broadway in recent years were the ones that utilize the "depressing star factor" as Isherwood calls it. To quote Brantley, "On Broadway you’ve got to start off with a brand name today. Clearly, audiences want something that they’ve seen before, or at least they know what they’re getting into, the way they would pick up a certain brand of ice cream or a piece of J. Crew clothing. And then, if they’re surprised by something, all the better. Which is not a climate conducive to experimentation."

Disheartening right? But why do audiences respond this way? Brantley says it's familiarity that audiences want. Are they responding to images of these "stars" that are put in front of them daily by the media? They become familiar with Jude Law so going to see him in Hamlet makes the foreign Shakespearean language itself seem more familiar. It can be argued that modern theatre, as a whole, produces that same feeling of something "foreign" because it isn't part of mainstream entertainment anymore, due to the popularity and accessibility of TV and movies... plus, the tremendous ticket prices in commercial theatres. But theatres don't just use star-power. They seek to make the audience comfortable with continuity in logos, season selection, and the theatrical experience as a whole. When you're fighting an uphill battle to get people in the seats you want to make the audience as comfortable as possible. When looking at it like that... yeah! Audiences need something familiar to latch onto in order to get butts in the seats! Like Vanessa Williams in Into the Woods:

Or P. Diddy in A Raisin in the Sun:

Or Catherine Zeta-Jones and Angela Lansbury in A Little Night Music:

But what about the idea that producing a live performance speaks to audiences in itself and it shouldn't need celebrities to do it!? The idea that theatre can speak to some core part of human beings. I have trouble articulating what it is about theatre that does that. It has something to do with another individual being vulnerable in front of us, telling the audience a story. Is that notion outdated? Idealistic? Call me an idealist and slap me silly, but I think there is something special about theatre that can move audiences to change, think, reflect, engage, and a bajillion other inspiring verbs. But, in the world of Broadway where breaking even on a lavish production will take a ridiculous number of performances can you afford to take a risk on the "magic of theatre?"

My answer, in the case of Broadway, is no. So, my semi-educated, probably naive opinion is that branding is what gets people in the door and the experience itself, the "theatre magic," if you will, is what keeps them coming back. Balancing these is essential, especially in commercial markets. Showcase Kelsey Grammar or Jude Law or P. Diddy on the billboards use modern aesthetic conventions like projections, hydraulics, laser beams, ushers on segways whatever... BUT provide a product that causes the audience to understand something in a new way, or feel something that needed to be tapped into, or relate to a situation... that's what keeps them coming back. If a star is there just to be a star... and not to tell the story in an exciting, engaging, moving way it's a sell out.

This conflict will probably be why I work in non-profits for the rest of my life. Helloooooo 501(c)3 forms! (Also... if you made it all the way to the end of this post... I'm impressed, it was longer than I expected. :o))