Production

[bison]

Have any of you had any experience with producing your own plays?
If yes, how did it go?
I think the experience itself would be worth the effort. Yes? No?

[Doug B]

I routinely produce (and direct) my own stuff.

Why?

Because that is what I do at our theater - I direct 90% of our work and I produce 100% of it.

Is it worth the effort? Yes. When I started our theater in 1999, I made a deal with myself - I would do everything and if I felt that I was doing more than my share I would quit. That includes producing, directing, set construction, lighting, sound, cleaning the bathrooms - you get the idea.

I like what I do. So far, I don't feel over worked - that are many, many volunteers that help whenever I need it.

I have had a few people agree to produce our work but there is so much to it that I spend as much time guiding them as I would if I did it myself. Besides producing takes relationships that take time to develop and it is hard for someone else to step in to do it. For example, a friend agreed to produce a book in show (we do very few of those because we can't control the quality). She wrote an article for the paper but hardly got any coverage. I stepped in at the last minute and called in a favor and got a real nice article with a big picture in the paper - it takes a lot of time to build and maintain those relationships.

Now to the heart of the matter.

Last August, we did eight of the short plays that I had written. Directing eight plays is impossible for one person - it amounts to 70 rehearsals.

I asked another director to help. She selected two to direct - a romantic comedy and a drama. I met with her twice to go over her vision for the plays and make sure she understood what I wanted out of the plays and the constraints of presenting eight plays in one night - minimal sets for example - limited special lighting for another.

To make a long story short, one of the plays she directed was about the next to last time I saw my father alive - when I had gone to Florida to tell him that he needed to go into an assisted living facility - his mind had pretty much turned to mush by then so any communications with him was difficult. She directed it as a comedy. The words were the same but the play sure wasn't. The up side is that the audience loved the play. BUT IT WASN'T WHAT I WROTE. To this day, I believe that what I wrote was far better.

I asked a very good friend who acted in another of the plays what he thought about her version of the play. He said that what she did and what I wrote were two very different plays - but equally good. Okay, I have to accept that.

BUT

I feel cheated. I will probably never get to see my version of the play. I can't do it here - that play has already been done. I don't have enough reputation to have the play picked up somewhere else.

I direct a LOT of new plays - that is one of the things we do. I feel that I have an additional obligation in presenting new plays to incorporate the playwrights vision of the play. Of course they will hear my thoughts on the play - that's part of my job - but it is important that we do the play as they see it. I don't have that same obligation to a play that has been set out for the world to do (through French or Dramatists, for example). In those cases I will use my vision of what the play is about.

Long answer but the truth is that I want to keep artistic control of my plays the first time they are presented.

[Doug B]

More thoughts.

When I reread my post of yesterday, I realized that I wandered off topic.

Here are my thoughts on producing:

If you can do it. Go ahead and do it. As I said I produce all of our shows and have since our inception in 1999. I don't like producing. It falls somewhere below scrubbing the bathrooms on my list of favorite things to do list.

The problem is that producing is unique to each theater and community. Even though I have produced dozens and dozens of shows, I would hesitate before taking on that assignment somewhere else.

I mentioned in my last post someone who agreed to produce a project for us. She asked me to just "give her a list" of what she needed to do. Close to the top of my list was publicity. Realizing that "publicity" didn't tell her much I broke it down into its component parts: Newspaper, posters, sandwich boards, library calendar, CofC newsletter, Actors Theater newsletter and so on. Then I realized that each had its own unwritten rules. For example, the newspaper deadline for news items for section two is Friday noon, except for performances, when they are required a week earlier. No where is that written. Nor the fact that the chances of getting coverage goes up dramatically if you give it to them in e-mail format or that you have to follow up because one in three e-mails gets "lost" if you don't. Or the fact that the press release has to open with "The Actors Theater Of Orcas Island announces . . . " otherwise you need to buy an ad to get coverage. And on and on.

I would be a very long book to write down everything I would need to share.

If you think you can handle all of that stuff, I am sure your group would LOVE to have you produce a show for them.

I say go for it!!!!!

Doug

[bison]

Doug,
How large is your community?
Do you have a "number" you would suggest that it takes to support such a venture?
Clearly, the scope of one's vision for the production will determine costs, but I'm asking what you think a bare minimum "house" needs to be.

[scottVee]

Thanks for the story, and sorry it didn't work out as expected. I directed a series of short films in the last few years, and there was always a point where something was too big for one person (me) to handle, but I wasn't sure anyone else could do it the way I wanted. That's a common management snafu in any industry or medium. It's hard to to delegate tasks to people who might not do what we want, or do as good a job as we could do ourselves -- but the only way to do MORE is to delegate.

An alternate dilemma is when it ends up taking longer to explain what needs to be done than to just go ahead and do it ourselves. That's one reason I shun the producer's role and prefer to write or direct or do technical tasks which are clearly defined, even though there's usually overflow between tasks on little productions.

I hope you can get the project done someday the way you envisioned it.

[endless rewrite]

I would not want to produce or direct any of my own plays. I don't have the skills to do so and the thing I most enjoy about watching a play through the production process is seeing and acting on the input of a director, actors and others. No, the end product is never what I imagined but it has always benefited from the input of others. I see playwriting very much as a collaborative process and I want and need that input to develop and improve my own work. No changes get made without consultation and you are expected to make changes and respond to developments/problems as the play is lifted off the page. My experience has been the writer works with a director to fine tune/final draft the script and when it goes into rehearsals you are there for the first two weeks of rehearsals and then you leave them to it unless there are problems that need addressing. I don't know how much of a critical eye I would have if I had complete control, I suspect I would miss a lot of potential as well as weak areas in my work.

I suppose it is different if you come from a production, directing background but all I have ever been able to do is the writing bit. Sometimes there just isn't the distance between you and your script to see where it needs work and you need a fresh pair of eyes, like a novelist needs an editor and how TV and screenwriters work closely with development people. I have thought about doing a course in directing to help with my own writing but cannot see a day when I would have the confidence to apply it beyond the page. But if you have the skills and confidence in place to do it then go for it, I prefer skulking in the background, plus I can always blame the director if it goes arse up!

[bison]

"I would not want to produce or direct any of my own plays."

I see what you are saying, but that sounds mostly like directing, not producing.
Someone correct me if my understanding is off here. Producing is the business management of the production. Directing is the creative aspect.
Could not one (if one had the expertise) take care of the money end and let the artistic folks lift the work off the page to the stage? I don't see a conflict there unless an ego got in the way of what they were doing with your baby.

[endless rewrite]

Hi

You are right, production is the management side, sorting out venues, money, hiring actors and a director, publicity etc. Have you thought about co-producing so you wouldn't shoulder all that responsibility and expense on your own?

Best of luck with it.

[Doug B]

I live on a small island an hours ferry ride from Washington state proper. We are actually closer to Victoria, B.C. than the US. Our population is 4,000 - a few less in the winter and a whole lot more in the summer. We have a 200 seat theater with a paid staff of four or five. Their budget is about $350,000 a year. I am president of a small 60 seat theater with an annual budget of $17,000. No one gets paid at our theater. The big theater does two shows a year - six performances each. We do five or six shows a year (depending on how tired I get) but only one or two are full productions. The rest are radio shows (read live) readers theater and short form shows. Next weekend we open our annual Ten Minute Playfest for local playwrights. The schedule is a killer for me - I will end up with almost 70 rehearsals over a six week period - but the actors like them because they only have eight or so rehearsals.

We started out doing small readers theater productions - three performances of each. We rehearsed five or six times anywhere we could get space for free. When we started out we were lucky to get double digit audiences - but we never had a production that lost money - many didn't make much but none lost money. We grew rapidly because our mantra is quality,quality, quality and quality. Quality scripts, quality production values, quality directing and quality acting. Over the last year we have averaged 75 people a show - in a 60 seat theater that's not bad.

The big theater rents the theater for $300 a performance night but, in fact, when you count the extra’s it comes to about twice that. Rehearsals cost $45 for up to three hours with no tech.

Their own productions are treated differently. I just finished directing Enchanted April there and here is the budget:

Royalties - $360
Scripts - $60
Costumes $1,000 (we spent around $500)
Sets - $2,500
Tech charges - $100
Promotion - $500
Directors fee - $1,000 actually paid to our theater rather than me
Space fees - $3,000.
Other - $500

Total $9,000

We presented Love, Sex and the IRS at our theater January of 2006.

Here is the budget for that:

Royalties - 260
Scripts - 55
Sets - 145
Other - 301 We used 10 breakaway bottles at $23 each which drove this number up.
Rent- 685
Advertising 51
Costumes - 45
Total 1,545

Income 2,464.50
Profit 919.70

Our theater normally charges $20 to $25 a night for rehearsals. And $75 to $100 for performance nights. We trade building maintenance for most of the rent. Our “home” is the local Grange building. When we settled in there it was a run down, rat infested building. We have made it into a popular venue for many groups.

In 2001 we did Neil Simon’s Chapter Two. Our total expenses were $1,300 - $500 for royalties and scripts and the rest for advertising, props and the set. We moved from venue to venue each night. We do almost entirely contemporary scripts so our actors can wear their own clothes.

I'd like to post two pictures - one of Enchanted April and One of Love, Sex and the IRS to show the difference in the presentation of the two budgets. The quality of the acting was the same in either production. Maybe they would let me post attachments for a day or so - I think they are illustrative of the difference in budgets.

I don't know if this is helping you or not.

[bison]

Doug,
That is exactly the feedback I was looking for. I can adapt that to my own
situation and have something to "guesstimate" on.
Thank you very much.
Continued success with your endeavors.