Production and distribution of City Club forums and ideastream public media are made possible by PNC and the United Black Fund of Greater Cleveland, Inc.. Good afternoon and welcome to the City Club of Cleveland, where we're devoted to conversations of consequence that help democracy thrive.

Today's Friday, March 1st.

And I'm Dan Waltrip.

I'm chief executive here.

And I am pleased to welcome all of us to today's forum.

It's the it's the least about Nick Cannon faith with an H. Wainstein memorial forum.

I think we can all agree that the landscape of small to midsize theater companies looks drastically different than it did March 1st, 2020.

Even before pandemic lockdowns changed theater as we knew it, dwindling arts funding and shrinking audiences have been known challenges.

And while some theaters have been forced to shutter in the face of these challenges, there is another story.

Theater, after all, is the business of creation, invention and reinvention.

In spring of 2023, five small to midsize theater companies joined forces to share resources, foster collective learning and champion new visions for the American theater.

Their goal individually and collectively, is to center historically marginalized artists and audiences in all facets of their work, as well as develop new models for artistic production, for audience building, for community engagement and more.

Now their innovative approach and their hard work has been recognized and supported in 2020.

In January 2024, Cleveland Public Theater was among a small cohort of companies that received groundbreaking grants from the Mellon Foundation.

Please applaud.

We're going to hear more about that.

But it will suffice at this moment to say that the purpose of these grants is to support these companies and these companies as they chart a new course for the future of American theater.

Joining us to hear more about what this partnership looks like, its goals and its vision.

And to that end, to discuss the future of American theater are Reginald Douglas.

He's artistic director for the Mosaic Theater.

Reginald has worked in numerous theaters and dedicated his career to creating new work and supporting new voices.

Cleveland's own Raymond Bobb, an executive artistic director of Cleveland Public Theater, a beloved arts institution here in Cleveland and an anchor in Cleveland's Gordon Square Arts District.

And Stephanie Ybarra, program officer at the Mellon Foundation, the philanthropic organization whose historic grantmaking made all of this possible.

Moderating our coverage.

Yes, please.

Also, what a great room this is.

This is so good.

Moderating our conversation today is Jennifer Coleman, good friend of the City Clubs, also program director of creative culture and arts at the George Gund Foundation.

I'm sure you'll have questions for our speakers if you're watching online or listening on WKYC.

You can text your questions to 3305415794.

The number again is 3305415794, and we'll work it into the second half of the program.

Those of you here in the room can ask those questions yourself.

Members and Friends of the City Club of Cleveland.

Please join me in welcoming this wonderful conversation to our stage.

Again, welcome to all our guests, especially those that are out of town.

But I'd like to talk a little bit about that, Grant, because in case you haven't heard, it is a five way $2.5 million grant.

Each organization receiving $500,000.

So as we've heard locally, Cleveland Public Theater is one of the recipients.

The others are company one theater in Boston, a crowded fire theater in San Francisco, Mosaic Theater in Washington, D.C., and Perseverance Theater in Juneau, Alaska.

This two year grant is designed is designed to support the five theaters in efforts to strengthen their relationship as a cohort, sharing knowledge about how to best serve their communities while pursuing similar missions.

So we're going to start off with Stephanie.

The Andrew Mellon Foundation is a largest supporter of arts and arts in the humanities nationally.

The program seeks to celebrate the power of the arts, to celebrate, activate and nourish the human spirit.

I really like that.

So you're kind of new at the Mellon Foundation.

You haven't quite finished up your first year?

I think it'll be in April and early April.

And you also have a power house experience working as a leader of many theaters nationally.

So, number one, tell us what made that decision to go from artistic directorship into being a program director at Mellon?

Well, I did not have philanthropy on my bingo card for sure.

I've worked in theater my whole career for almost 30 years now.

And but when Mellon called me and asked if I would consider coming in and using my field expertize to help bolster not just theater, but all of the performing arts.

So who says no to that?

So it was it's it's been a real gift to be able to look at the lessons that I've learned in my time as an actor and as an administrator, as an as a producer, and then to also to use that to inform and support those who are practicing dance and music and opera and to also receive learning from them and to be able to share that learning with my theater colleagues.

Awesome.

That is, I can't agree more with having a diverse experience going into philanthropy because it gives you a really different perspective.

So tell me a little bit about the genesis of this grant.

How did it come about?

Were you actually there when it started with the cohort, or was this just something because it's a very different type of grant than we see?

Sure.

I wasn't there when the cohort started talking to each other.

I was still running my own theater.

But by the time I got to the Mellon Foundation, I think it was our pals at company.

One had reached out just for a meeting.

I mean, this is what we do as as program officers.

We have tons of conversations before any grant gets made and when our colleagues at Company One mentioned that they were in relationship with these other theaters and these leaders, that was the moment.

So I sort of leaned in.

I was like, Tell me more.

Because I know all of these theaters and the respective leaders, we've all been in the field together.

So I know them individually as I thought leaders, as righteous advocates for justice in the theater, and I know them all to be incredibly brilliant artists in their own right.

To hear that they had been working together and collaborating.

That was just that was like the icing on the cake.

And what I know from being in a practitioner and from seeing the field from a national viewpoint is that that collaborative approach, the abundance of sharing ideas, resources and fellowship, that if there was one direction, one lever I could, there isn't one lever, but if there was one lever, I could say we push to get wherever we're going.

It's that.

So it was a no brainer.

It was a no brainer to say let let us help buoy your your collaboration.

And and I'll go on record to say it's only the beginning.

We're here.

We're here for this.

Absolutely.

So a little bit of, I think, a softball length.

But what's so special about these these five organizations?

Well, as I said, I think the the institutions themselves are really well known in the theater field.

But an institution mission, in my opinion, is simply a legal vehicle that we funnel resources through.

An institution is only as as effective as the humans animating it and leading each of these institutions are humans who are just, like I said, this brilliant thought partners, thought leaders, and they are the ones who at the local level inside of their rehearsal halls, inside of their boardrooms, inside of their community contexts, and at the national level, inside of our conferences and inside of our Zoom calls.

They're the ones standing up and saying, this isn't right, we're going here, or we could do better, and really calling us to our highest aspirations as a field.

So a geeky program officer question what is the process with working with this ten year grant?

How are you working with the organizations?

Because they're very self activated.

But how from a foundations point of view, are you working with them?

You know, I'm still learning how all of this works.

What I'm trusting is that our professional relationships are going to help inform an emergent communication process and a collaboration process as they start to convene more regularly.

I trust these humans and these leaders to sort of loop loop me in or loop us in when there is an inflection point that that Mellon should be listening for or that we can be supportive of or help amplifier inform.

And I think that as we go through the next couple of years, my hope is that whatever seeds start to germinate is that the right and my science and correctly, whatever seeds we're sowing, as those begin to we see what's what wants to take root.

That's where the foundation will come back in, in a really intentional way, so that we can start to plan what's what comes after two years.

Okay.

That was my other question is what would you like to see in what order in 20, 20, 24?

So this grant is ends in about 2026 ish.

So do you have hopes as a from philanthropy's point of view as to what you'd like to see?

I, I only hope I don't have hopes for like a product.

To me, the, the magic here is about the process of collaboration and the modeling of a different way of being in relationship to each other, to each other, across geographic constituencies and a different way of being in relationship to a local community and communities, plural.

So I'm hoping to see what starts to come of that.

And I want to help amplify and and sort of get others to iterate on that.

Right.

Awesome.

Trust is the key word that I hear in that and also the idea of collaboration.

Because, you know, especially in these times, we always say collaboration, collaboration.

But really, I think know we're going to be we got to hang together or we'll hang separately and really sort of get to the genius of what collaboration means is going to be critical.

So move on to regional because we're going to say framing for the end Mosaic Theater bills itself as community centered and cross-cultural.

So what does that mean?

Tell us, Clevelanders, a little bit about your philosophy on math.

Sure.

It's such an honor to be here.

And thank you, Stephanie.

I'm trying not to cry because I got all the feels right now.

I just feel so full of joy and gratitude to be in collaboration and community with Raymond and Stephanie in this cohort and to be reminded of the why of our work in this way.

It's such a gift.

Our mission at Mosaic is to be a mosaic.

We believe in the value of bringing diversity of cultures, perspectives, communities, neighbors into one room to experience a story that provokes thought, catalyzes conversation.

And I think that the thoughts that happen when you're watching great like cues and going, I never thought of it that way.

When a character gives you that great monologue or song, those thoughts can happen and stay with you at the ballot box and at the school board meeting.

And when you talk to your neighbor and when you don't call the cops and people are having a barbecue, I have to believe that the stories we put on stage can spark a dialog with people who normally may not speak to one another.

So a lot of our work is intentionally bringing different communities into one room.

One way we do that is through our intergenerational work.

Our education work is for seniors and high school students.

So they see a play together and then have dialog about that play.

We spearheaded that program with the production call it the Till Trilogy.

So a writer, if the buyers are thinking about the legacy of Emmett Till's death, but more so, what does his life mean to us?

What could his life have meant to have people in the audience who lived through the civil rights movement sitting right next to young people experiencing the Black Lives Matter movement and being able to have that history come yet alive again.

That's the magic of theater for us at Mosaic, and we do that in a neighborhood that is historically African-American.

When Dr. King was assassinated, the neighborhood, eighth Street, Northeast riots, revolution, protest.

And like many neighborhoods, it got left behind.

But the artist, we believe, can bring that community's story into the archive.

And so through our oral history project, we've commissioned three black playwrights who live and work in DC.

So really centering our local artists and giving them work and opportunity to share their gifts.

They interviewed neighbors past and present, living in that neighborhood, and then we've archived those oral histories into the DC Public Library.

So the voices of our community are preserved forever in the cultural canon, and they also will inspire new plays.

And so this March three new plays inspired by those conversations will be shared at Mosaic.

That's the kind of work we're doing to be community centered, to bring cross-cultural both and diversity of races but also ages and community members who may not speak to one another.

What if the theater could be a place for conversation.

Right now, you're also a bit of a newbie at Mosaic.

We're going into our 10th anniversary as an organization and I and just announced the next season, which would be my third full season as artistic director.

Outstanding.

So you're you're also Mosaic is also a resident theater at the Atlas Performing Arts Center.

So tell us a little bit about Atlas.

Sure.

Atlas, founded by the great Jane Lang, a cultural diamond of Dynamo, rather a real leader and Washington, DC arts and culture.

She restored historically black theater.

She restored in 2006.

And so the Atlas is now a venue that hosts four different theater spaces and has resident companies.

So Mosaic is one of those organizations, and we're in a community with an orchestra and a dance group and a youth theater program.

And so it's great to be in collaboration every day with other performing arts organizations.

So.

DC We are, we've got a lot of, as you can think, there are a lot of Cleveland theaters in the audience.

But tell us a little bit about what DC is going through as a theater community.

DC is, it's really thriving.

I think, you know, we've had some shift in leadership across the city and so one of the things I never take for granted about the Washington DC artistic director community we like each other.

It makes collaboration so much easier when it's a phone call and a text.

It's a, Hey, what's up?

What if?

And so, you know, my middle name is partnerships.

I believe deeply in working with other organizations.

One, it's shared marketing.

We all need an audience.

Let's share the resources and get people into the theater.

You know, if you're going to see a show at the Folger, led by the wonderful Karen Daniels and you read that program and you see what's happening at Arena Stage, led by the fierce Hannah Sharif.

It excites you to go see her and then you can come to us.

It's abundance.

But that kind of collaboration comes because we like each other, we believe in each other, we're rooting for each other, and we share the same values.

And I really don't take for granted that for the most part, we all really like new work.

We really believe in artist and we are really excited about the diversity of what our audience is and what it could be.

And I'm really grateful to be in collaboration with many artistic leaders who are looking at their audience and saying, Who else?

You know, who else could be in this room and let's go get them.

And I think that's why our programing feels very racially diverse.

I think we're getting more diverse in form, which is really exciting.

And our audience has been wonderful.

You know, they have come back.

None of us are at numbers pre-pandemic.

But the people that are there, I think really want to be there.

And we have a very loyal philanthropy community as well.

So DC didn't have as harshly as I think some other cities did, the kind of theaters closing, you know, closing, right, in some ways where not just here, but I think we are really in a spirit of thrive.

So in regards to this particular grant and the cohort, which is the most fascinating thing to me, how did that start?

How what was that first texter phone call?

Well, I remember I.

Was on the way home from this is a great example of Washington, DC community.

I was directing a show at a different theater at Round Theater led by the wonderful Ryan Rolet.

I was directing Radio Call an August Wilson play, and those are long plays.

And so I was on the way home and I got a text from Raymond, and I kind of tried to do like tomorrow we can talk.

And he said, no, it's kind of, you know, we don't like using the word urgent too much.

But it was like, I really think we should talk today.

And so I called him.

I called him back and he said, Sean Company one, the artistic director, has an idea and I think I probably started crying.

Sounds emotional.

Driving a car.

But it was it was a joy bond.

It felt like a hug, you know, to have other people who I knew personally.

Again, I knew their personal values, their personal why of working, why they were in these positions and what their company's mission were, are, and to be invited to help dream up something.

And at that point, there was no funding.

It was just, what if we all talk to each other?

And I really needed that community.

And so to be in community with other artistic directors and now we're embracing getting our teams involved.

It really feels like community and having a safe space to say, this is what's happening, this is what I'm dealing with.

How are you thriving?

How are you doing?

Was one of the first calls.

Let's just how is everyone that is the gift of this national partnership.

We're answering the same questions in different ways.

And I'm also really excited by how, even in these national conversations, I think they're affirming our desire to work hyper locally because we're inspired by the specificity of what each organization is doing in their communities.

So in company, one tells us about how they are taking their theater productions out of theaters and partnering with the library.

It makes me go, Oh yeah, we're doing something right here in D.C. by partnering with our public library on our high school playwriting contest.

It's a reminder that what they're doing in their local community can affirm and inspire what we do in our local communities.

But I have a resource that's outside a bird's eye view to bounce ideas off of.

It's a gift.

I know I keep asking you guys so early on in the process, like, what do you hope?

Because it is like you said, a process.

It's going to take a while.

And what is what's on your mind right now is going to be different than two months from now, but just sort of spitball it.

What do you think the most transformative opportunity is going to be from this?

Grant?

You know something that hit me, I think we're thinking about about archiving with this oral history project on my mind.

Also a production we're doing next year that's also based on oral histories.

And I think getting things on record really matters.

And so as thought leaders, I'm curious about how we capture some of that.

You know, the essence of what we all think new play development could look like, what community engagement could feel like, getting that language documented, I think so that the next Reggie and Raymond's can have it feels like the really exciting gift we can offer the field, not rulebook, but perhaps a guidebook of ways.

We figured some things out so that you can take them and blow them back up.

But I think because I am inspired by the Spirit of abundance and increase that my colleagues are leading their organizations with, I want to get that out into the field, whether that's immediate or in the next ten years, that's something that's really on my mind right now.

Andy All right, Raymond, you're up now.

Now.

So, Raymond, you have been active in public theater for 18, going on 19 years.

So you are like Big Daddy.

On this end of world all but that.

So just thinking a little bit about Cleveland I know it is almost seem Santana now about like 2018 2017 that we're climbing a hill and or climbing a mountain and you think you're at the peak in the near there.

And then there's another thing and we've just been going up and up and we don't know where the end of this is.

But given where Cleveland and Cleveland and your time and probably in the last five years or so, what is your assessment of where we are?

Cleveland.

Cleveland.

I can't I can't do that.

I think what I, I think what first of all, the theater scene here is incredibly strong.

And I feel like when you look at the work being done, you know, at Obama near where I say caramel, at so many different theaters in this region that are not big, big theaters, they don't have big endowments.

And they're not just these small ones.

These theaters are making so much difference and impact.

And I think there is something really interesting here about like DC is thriving and I'm thinking, yeah, we have some of the best leadership right now, I think in Cleveland Theater that we've had, you know, certainly than when when I came in and just the vision, the the the leadership I mean, Tony's leadership academy has been astounding.

The incredible succession.

That the incredible story of success here at.

West Theater was just amazing.

And, you know, what Nathan has done at Obama is just his response to I think a lot of change in the community has just been outstanding and really leaning into social justice.

So I think as a as a theater community, we are strong and there's a bunch of reasons for that that we could like drill into the technical side.

I think, however, we will continue to serve a group of people who saw theater ten years ago, and that is a very small group.

And what's really exciting to me right now, and I think part of the reason why, why we wanted to be together and all of these things is because of the work of saying, we want to bring people together, we want to come, you know, being at a CVT show and when we ask how many of you are here for the first time and over half the hands go up and they say, How many of you is this first theater time, first time you've been in the theater in the last year or five years, and a majority of the people are raising their hand.

That's exciting.

And I think that is what we are really leaning into is, you know, sitting at a front row when someone in the front row is like weeping next to me.

And afterwards I'm like, Are you okay?

And he says, You have no idea what it's like to hear my language spoken on stage for the first time in my adult life a lawyer or I'm a doctor or whatever else, and here I am doing that.

That's exciting.

And I think those conversations are beginning to happen in Cleveland.

But theater can lead that way.

Theater can be the place where communities can come together and talk in new ways and meet people in new ways.

And it's a place where the needle can really move.

And I've seen it over and over again.

Absolutely.

And one thing, I think Cleveland is not afraid to be challenged, the audiences and definitely the theaters in regards to challenge.

And it's almost expected.

But we do have a dichotomy that's happening nationally and, you know, sometimes sometimes people want to be entertained with something light and music and and then sometimes they want to really look at issues that are challenging, issues that there's no answers to.

But here's a perspective of it that's put into a theater format.

So how does CPD actually look at that sort of tension?

Yeah, well, I think I think, first of all, there is there there is a need I have a need to just shut off, to shut the brain off, to go home and watch Netflix or whatever else.

We all we all have this need.

I just don't think theater is very good at that all the time.

And when it is good at it, it's because it's like people are flying and and zooming overhead and massive production.

But there's another purpose for theater, and that is something that is deep and personal.

When you walk out of the room and you feel transformed or you feel seen for maybe the first time in your adult life, you're like, That's my story.

Or You're seeing your neighbor in a whole different way.

You know that that to me is a much more profound experience.

Like, yes, people want to be entertained and Playhouse Square is going to keep going strong and be awesome with Broadway shows.

But there is some other function that theater is particularly awesome.

Enjoy.

And I think, you know, it's been said many times, but there's a reason why in the West or in the Europe European tradition, why theater and democracy got formed.

At the same time, I think the mission of the city club here about democracy just ties right in to the mission of Cleveland Public Theater.

And I think and this is that that thing of like you have to practice things to get good at that and the theater is where you go and you practice compassion or you practice being more conscious and being more awake.

And in this moment, you know, there's incredible vision that I inherited from James Levine about a theater that was there to nurture compassion and to raise consciousness.

I mean, that's that's visionary.

Right?

And to think of.

Ideas, all that version ideas at the same time.

Complex, complex thought at the same time.

Yeah, we're not good at advertising or, like.

Like, don't do drugs like that.

That is not going to theater is not good for that.

Right.

But theater but theater is really good at saying, wait a second, why is this happening?

And how does that actually relate to me and where do I need to act from?

Right.

So back to the cohort and sense, what is your thoughts on how it formed?

Oh, okay.

So well, first of all, I met Raj through a nationally playing network and, and I met him and I was just like totally blown away by so many things.

But what he's done artistically where I don't know if we were in like an Uber or a car together and you were just talking, I'm just like, who is this person?

And so, so when we got the National Theater Conference Award for like National Award at Cleveland Public Theater, I got to also give an award to an emerging artist and I call the French.

I'm like, Are you emerging?

I mean, kind of lord of mercy.

It's like like here.

I'll be emerging for an award.

And so, you know, I've been watching him and and so.

Yeah, yeah.

So so, you know, there is already that relationship and then company one I mean they were the theater that coming out of pandemic also was doing choose what you pay pricing just like we started doing and they've been doing incredible work and we were sharing a piece together that we were premiering together and rolling world premiere of Can I Touch It by Fran DaSilva.

And, and so, so we knew them really well.

And so I was talking with Sean and I was just, we were both expressing this thing of like, we're in such a weird little niche in the nation.

We're not these big theaters, we're not small theaters.

We're not necessarily a theater of color.

And yet at the same time, a majority of the work that we're doing is by black, indigenous and people of color.

And we're all doing new work.

And who are who can we get together to think about this?

Because it's kind of this interesting place where I think some of the most exciting theater is happening, but simultaneously it's hard right?

The large organizations obviously are going to pull a huge amount of resource and they have endowments and all this.

And there's a lot of funders who want to fund these small organization because it's exciting and good and I want them to be funded too.

And we're kind of caught in the center sometimes.

And so we were talking about just things like that, the dynamics of our staff and how to be artists and administrators at the same time and all these things.

And, and, and I said, you know, I've several times tried to find a way to bring people together that share these values and chances.

Yeah, I think we should form some kind of cohort who should be there.

And I said, Randy, it's like, of course.

And then.

And then we started thinking about, Hey, we want to make sure that that we recognize a company that is especially focused on the indigenous community.

And so that's why we talk to Leslie.

And Leslie and I are co-chairing a strategic plan for nationally play network together.

And then we also talking a lot about leadership and crowded fires, experimenting and leadership in a really exciting way.

With now five artistic directors, all who have different responsibilities, but all who are artistic directors of the company.

So we're just kept thinking and talking.

And then company one said, Hey, we have a meeting with Mellon Foundation and and we think we're going to talk about the cohort instead of just us.

And that means that that is how this cohort spent from the very beginning.

Like we all were all looking out for each other.

So, okay, I got one question and while I'm.

Asking it, you guys think about what your questions that you'd like to ask are, and it really has to do.

It's one of the questions I always ask when I hear these fabulous national grants that come to different organizations.

But what does this mean for Cleveland or for.

I know Reggie talked a little bit about it in terms of, you know, putting things on paper.

But for both of you and also for Stephanie, you know, the different communities, the five communities that these theaters are and how is it going to benefit us?

Yeah, well, I think, first of all, I mean, it is a recognition not just of Cleveland public theater because clean public theater wouldn't be here without this incredible community.

So I think on the one hand, it's just like a celebration.

It's a win for Cleveland and and for Cleveland theaters.

And and so that's that's good.

Cleveland needs some wins.

Right.

And and also, though, this is not something that just I mean, you know, it's funny, I was looking at it some of the tables where there are some artists and staff and it's like we share, you know, there's no one who's like, I am a Cleveland Public Theater exclusive performer or artist.

We share all of these.

Aren't all of our artists work at all of our organizations?

When Something transformative happens at CBT.

It happens across the community as well.

So I think this is going to be a game changer and I'm hoping that that will I'm hoping that we'll have a local like conference of us.

And we're definitely going to have moments.

We connect to everyone.

We just feel like I feel like I want these four theaters to meet my colleagues here because there's so much we have to share.

And I want my colleagues here to meet these people.

They're so awesome and learn together.

So Reggie.

What this means for DC?

Yeah, yeah.

Because I've maybe to two answers.

One is this grant hits that Mosaic's 10th anniversary and so it really helps make a stamp of solidifying that.

We are here in the DC theater community and doing something unique that is a value in attention.

And so my board is listening in and I know all of us, my staff is listening and we're just grateful that you see us and you see our work.

The organization has been on a journey in their very thick ten years, but to be now standing, going into this next, you know, decade with reserves, all the nonprofit people is an investment is an investment in our values and our visions.

That's what it means for Mosaic and for DC.

We really are trying to our our tenant that Stephanie gave us is to keep doing new work from a place of equity.

And so we are thrilled to have two world premiere productions by artists of color, written and directed by artists of color happening at Mosaic.

Right now, we get to keep doing more of that work and sharing those stories with Washington and for all of our work.

We have community engagement, community partners.

And so Riana Yazzie, a Navajo American playwright, having her first big city production, the world premiere of Nancy we're doing right now.

On Saturday, she'll be at the Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian.

That's the kind of partnerships we're building.

And Rihanna gets to take her rightful place on that stage and share her story and why her work as an artist is valuable.

To.

A sitting in our nation's home of learning.

She deserves that seat and the support of the Mellon Foundation allows us to keep giving her and other artists like her the stage and welcoming our community to join them.

So it's a real gift for us, but also, I think for Washington in that way, that.

It's not just about Cleveland, it's about what this grant is about.

I think when the professional regional theater movement started, there was a language that was used because people for the first time were saying, We want to be pros, we want to be professionals.

We're different than the other theaters that are amateur.

And they called they at that moment made a language choice and they called the amateur theaters, community theaters.

And right now, what's happening in American theater is we are reconciling with that divide in years ago because the most professional theater should be the most community focused.

And that is what this grant is all about.

And my mind is feeling that we're and moving.

That's it.

I mean, I feel like they nailed it.

And when I think about a the Mellon Foundation that I stepped into is deeply invested and concerned at what is happening at the hyperlocal.

And we are in partnership with artists and organizations.

We want to amplify and impart to to help hopefully unlock back to sort of shine a light as much as we can to help unlock other resources, whether it's financial or creative or what have you.

So a win for Cleveland, a win for D.C..

When theaters win, communities thrive, period.

So that's what this is about.

To put that.

On a T-shirt.

It's just such a good conversation.

My name is Dan Waltrip.

We're about to begin the audience Q&A.

Can you just see a quick show of hands for like who feels like who's getting like theater, camp vibes, anybody else?

Yeah, this is a while.

I just have to say for the audience, it's listening on the radio, looking around the room at all of the organizations that are involved in putting great work on stages and in supporting people who have a great work on stages.

It's just really inspiring.

So thank you all so much for being a part of this.

Today we are talking about the future of American theater and our panelists are Reggie Douglas from Mosaic Theater, Raymond Bobbin of Cleveland Public Theater, and Stephanie Barr Ibarra, program officer of the Mellon Foundation.

Jennifer Coleman of the Gun Foundation is moderating our conversation.

As you know, we welcome questions from everyone, city club members, those of you in the room students.

And if you'd like to text a question, you can text it to 3305415794.

The number, again, for our listening audience is 3305415794 and our team will work it into the program.

We have our first question, please.

I'm going to work one of those in right now.

We have a text question.

There's a there's new research showing that attracting new audiences does not necessarily lead to theater's increased income.

Do you think experimental and socially aware theater can ever be economically sustainable?

Can I please take this one.

Yeah, please.

Theater.

If you.

I will not bore you all with the economics of theater, especially when we have theater practitioners in the room.

The most sucks full of our shows.

They do not pay for themselves.

The labor costs are too high.

It is too bespoke a product.

That's why philanthropy has to happen.

If you're familiar Google cost disease and you will find you can go down a rabbit hole that will tell you all about why even the most successful of our nonprofit productions cannot pay for itself.

Especially when you are contemplating the indirect costs.

Right.

So let's just stop with the fallacy that one kind of theater is economically successful and another kind is not.

That said, I want to I want a show of hands for anybody in the room or show your hands on in your cars or wherever you are.

Have you heard of the commercially successful theater production of Hamilton?

Yeah, sure.

Look, look, look.

It is one of the more entertaining, socially aware productions.

There is commentary built in and every beat.

That was intentional.

The casting was intentional.

It is.

It is a political literally a political commentary.

And it is the most successful theater production of our generation.

And I.

You guys want to comment?

I think she's.

Audience Would you like me?

I can't run here because I got just to say, I got that a lot as an artistic director.

Oh, when you put put your politics.

And I just also want to say, take my recording black and brown and indigenous bodies and trans bodies, putting politicized identities on stage is not the same thing as being political.

Okay.

All right, everybody.

Thank you for this forum.

It's incredible to hear what's happening with theater and what's happening with this Mellon Foundation grant.

I'm Raymond's neighbor.

Geographically and also artistically.

I run a small live music venue just down the street from Raymond.

My question is, what we're seeing is this this split in audiences.

The Broadway shows may be doing well.

Taylor Swift is doing well, but the audiences haven't come back, at least on the live music side.

I'm not sure if that's the same.

On.

On the small and mid-sized theater side.

But can you talk about what is happening with your audiences?

Are they back?

And if they aren't back, why do you think they haven't come back?

That's a great question.

I'll talk a little bit about I'm curious what's going on with you.

I think Cleveland Public Theater, if you looked at our audience from ten years ago, you would not see the same audience that's there now.

But numbers wise, coming back from pandemic.

Till now, we're maybe down one or 2% on an average night.

So we're we're pretty much back.

But for me, what's exciting is about who's in that audience and what that audience looks like.

You know, I just think of really every show we've done this season just saying this is a different audience.

This is a different audience.

The difference.

We're not subscription based, right?

We're not trying to sell all of these shows to all people because frankly, if I'm an incredibly busy, busy person and I'm doing tons of things and I'm going to go to see that show where my languages spoken on onstage and I might not go see another show, and that's okay.

So I think the model of like, we're going to have this, this one group of people and they're going to buy all of our tickets.

That doesn't work for for Cleveland Public Theater.

And I don't think it's work going to work long term for the theater.

But I think audiences are coming back when the work is about something essential to them or essential to their neighbors or essential to their their community.

And that's the thing.

When they said only essential industry should keep going during pandemic, and how many arts organizations said, we are essential.

We don't know how we're going to keep in business.

We're going to keep going.

So for me, when theater is essential, then the audiences are there.

And I would.

Add, yes.

And everything Raymond is saying and for us, it's about being intentional.

And who are we inviting into the audience?

You know, we're going into our 10th anniversary, my third year as artistic director, and we've doubled audience from when I joined because of the pandemic and a leadership shift.

I replacing a founder.

So there was a natural attrition expected and then COVID said, you're going to stay home for a while.

So looking at our audience, we're thrilled by the growth, like the numbers of subscriptions is is rising.

You know, all the trends are are the sales are going in the right direction.

But I'm also really grateful for the intention inside that audience.

I mentioned the seniors and high school students actively telling other organizations to join us, to come be a part of our work, and we will lift you up when you're on our stage.

That kind of reciprocal marketing and that partnership that's at the artistic level as well as the marketing level.

There's a richness in our audience that I'm really excited by, and I'm also thrilled to say, you know, audience tends to buy audience usually as ticket buyers, but who are the people who you're inviting in with a free ticket, with a subsidized ticket, and being able to see the senior centers and the high school students, you know, the community partners who just come for free because we believe in them and want their stories to be told and them to see themselves on stage.

That work is really exciting to me.

And last thing I'd say, which I'm grateful for, is over these past three years, under my leadership, our donors are increasing so grateful for national funding like the moment, but also hyper local believers who are believing in vision and they're investing their resources and their time in the what if of this organization and what in the what if of my leadership.

And that is a gift to see that number increasing is really puts a wind in our sails.

And hello Andrew Waterson.

I'm in the board of Public Theater.

My question has to return back to the grant and what's the vision that you have for.

Not just the collaboration of the artistic directors, but also.

The staff and the artistic talent at the theaters and how that might trend trends translate across the geographic boundaries of the theater.

I think we're all members of national new play networks.

We met each other as artists as well as artistic directors.

And there's already just natural conversations about sharing plays and sharing, you know, something that's cool.

Play right here to come visit you there.

And that's a hope I have.

It's just some artistic sharing.

And in terms of the staff, what gets me most excited is I joke about the idea of our development associate dean going to Alaska and getting the Shadow Leslie and her team for a week.

I hope that we're able to have staff sharing as well so that this doesn't live and leadership brains alone, but actually is again, abundance for our whole team can can learn from one another.

I think there's nothing more important for Mosaic than our marketing staff meeting and learning from company one's marketing staff.

They're doing very similar work in terms of form and content and they are doing it as pay what you can.

We're not that's a big juicy what if that our staff needs to be thinking about who better to teach them than people who are doing it really well.

Also with Raymond and the CP team are doing in terms of real deep community relationship building.

I'd love for our Sara to go spend a week in Cleveland soaking up Raymond's knowledge, so I do have hope for staff sharing in that way as well.

One of the really cool things about this grant and what I think for me it's just really so refreshing was when we when we even came together, we were like, we're going to be different.

And there was a moment when Stephanie was like, okay, now you have X amount of days and once we tell you you're going to ten days to do it and everyone in the meeting afte this is exactly what we don't want to be doing urgency.

And this is going to be against our brand.

Do we really want to do this and really about our brand was like, we're going to do things differently.

We don't have we didn't come and say we have this exact plan and was so awesome.

Was the trust that we're going to figure it out.

This is an experiment.

This this cohort is an experiment.

And but we're both learning we're going to learn how to be a cohort while we learn from each other as well.

So good afternoon.

So great to see you all.

Longtime board member of Northwest Theater.

Here's my question.

You've talked a lot about the importance of theater to help community, to bring people together.

Mr. Barr, you made a comment just now about if you put different kinds of people on stage, that's not being political.

Here's my question.

In this very divided country, we.

Have very divided community.

We have.

Is it the role of theater, community, theater to help bring people together politically or is it too dangerous?

Do you then get identified as being on one side or the other?

What's the role of politics, then, if any, in theater?

I'm so sorry.

No, no.

No, no, no.

Oh, I think that that's that's a question that I feel like is a little bit to each their own in terms of how they want to.

That's the that's the beauty of art making is where do you want to live on any given spectrum with this piece, art, with this line or this curatorial choice?

What I do know is this.

I quote Adrian Marie Brown.

Any time I can, she has this quote, I feel like I'm just going get tattooed on my arm.

She says, Art is not neutral.

Art is not neutral.

It is either upholding the status quo, which is a choice, or it is pushing against it.

And that that can be made at it could be a you know, a I programed once in this season, which is my was my last season the importance of being earnest.

You cannot get much more status quo than the importance of being earnest.

Right.

That's a choice.

Inside of that choice come many different artistic choices about who is animating that particular script.

And so I don't I don't know.

I think it's for each artist and each theater to answer at any given time.

What is the role of this moment and this show in this moment?

But I but I don't think at any point I think we're fooling ourselves if we ever get to think that theater is neutral or art is neutral, it is not because to to say neutrality, to say I'm my hang back, that's a choice.

I mean, you look at Shakespeare, which people think of as dusty old, highly political.

Highly.

Highly political.

And even if you do take the importance of being earnest, how you cast it, how you actually the messages that you have change.

And they change with the time as to why an all female cast or a cast of color, all of that is reflective of what's going on in our community.

We're never neutral.

We'll never be neutral.

Never won an Oscar Wilde wasn't neutral when he wrote the play.

I just I think that this is a really troubling question to me, because I think there is something that has happened in the United States, where communities don't have art.

And if you can't learn what fiction is, you can't know what facts.

And I do think that there is a real problem because we have not, as an artistic community, thought hard enough and long enough about listening.

And that is another skill we learn when we go to the theater.

You know, I'm going to bring up an incredibly hard thing for me to talk about, and I think it's hard for and I apologize for bringing this into the room.

There's a horrific war going on right now in Israel and Palestine.

And Cleveland Public Theater walked out of doing an amazing production created by Master Cleveland Al-Araibi of the Outstretched Hand.

We're now doing a production by Israel's most lauded playwright, Hannah Levine Requiem.

It is hard to be in that place right now because it is a place where I don't know always that I am in the right.

I can't stand up in this issue at all and say, I know what should happen.

I am right.

I know what to do.

And I do think, although art is not neutral, art is inherently a question.

And I think that we have be open and transparent and keep trying to create the spaces where people can come together and listen.

And so, yeah, it's challenging and it's especially hard for an Israeli artist who is in that play.

And for one of the cast members who was born in Lebanon, who's Arab, who is in that play and the challenges that they have of of perceiving the perception that maybe they're crossing a line.

I wish we had more time.

However, if you would like to hear if you want more of this, you have to buy a ticket to the theater.

I want to thank our our panelists today, Reginald, Raymond, Stephanie and Jennifer, thank you so much as well for moderating our conversation.

Forums like this one are made possible.

Thanks to generous support from individuals like all of you who are here in the room and all of you who are listening.

You can learn more about how to become a guardian of free speech at City Club dot org.

Our forum today is the Lisa bottleneck care and faith with an H. Weinstein Memorial Forum.

The special forum alternates annually between the exploration of creativity in memory of Lee Subotnick and a focus on the continuing challenges of human persecution in memory of care and faith.

With an H. Weinstein is our honor to dedicate this year's forum to Lisa Bartunek.

Our gratitude to her mother, Allen, who is with us today for her continued support of forums that reflect her daughter's joy of creativity.

Around the arts.

Have a wonderful weekend.

Our form is adjourned.

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