Theatre Design & Technology - Spring 1991 - 26

ning off star-studded revivals of
Shakespeare and Williams to Broadway.
Meanwhile, the companies they once led
are devoting more and more of their
repertories to new and old musicals, and
American producers and critics are shopping for new products along the corridors of established classical theaues.
A ew York Times article on this subject, noting the predominance of English
talent in the American musical theaue,
was entitled "The Empire Suikes Back."
A better title would have been "The
Empire Strikes Our." Certainly, the
American resident theaue movement has
also been suiking out lately to the point
where, in many cities of this country, it is
barely distinguishable form the commercial theaue in any way except its designation nonprofit 501-c3.
efore I leave this rather
depressing issue, let me cite
one more possible reason for
the disappointing record,
recently, of the once-promising resident theatre movement: Time
itself. The initial leaders of this movement were usually men and women who
had founded their theaues and provided
them with their structure and vision.
Their enthusiasm managed to attract not

only a group of like-minded artists, but
patrons from the community ready ro
suppOrt their work in a crucial moral and
financial way. ow that the movement is
over 30 years old, many of its leaders
have either died, burned out, or retired,
with the result that power over the theatre has shifted not to their artistic successors but rather to their managing
directors and their Boards. Board members hold the purse strings; they also hold
the power ro hire and fire. But whereas
old warriors like Tyrone Guthrie and
Joseph Papp and William Ball usually
had the capacity to keep a Board at bay, if
not productive and friendly (Adrian Hall
once fire a Board when it started to get
rambunctious), their young artistic director replacements are considerably more
subject to the whims and caprices of
financial advisors. In most cases, this second artistic generation is composed of
gifted and imaginative directors. But
since they didn't found their theatres and,
in most cases, have abdicated fund raising
to development people, they are often
much less involved with the fiscal health
of the institutions they run. In economic
terms, they are more like employees than
independent leaders. In psychological
terms, they are rather like sons and
daughters who accept their allowance

without feeling any particular responsibility for keeping the family bank
account in balance.
In consequence, their jobs are always
at risk if subscriptions falter or unearned
income drops, and their theatres become
accountable not to the exigencies of artistic exploration but rather to the vagaries
of the box office. This puts the resident
theatre-to borrow a term from Jean
Genet-back in the brothel, and explains
why so many of its leaders have begun to
lose heart and desert it. Adrian Hall, the
brilliant artistic director of Trinity Rep
and, later, of the Dallas Theatre
Company, is only the latest casualty of
the general anomie. An eloquent and
dedicated spokesman for nonprofit companies, as well as one of our most imaginative creative artists, he has now abandoned the movement ro seek personal
satisfactions in general freelancing and
movie-making. And who can blame him
when the system proceeds, so remorselessly and inexorably, to such the idealism
and adventure-and pleasure-out of
any promising theatrical venture.
I may be exaggerating the exten t of
the rot, but even if what I say is only partially accurate, it is a pretty depressing
account of theatre in this country. And,
under these circumstances, you may ask,

THE UNIVERSITY
OF TEXAS
AT AUSTIN
DEPARTMENT OF DRAMA

BA in Drama, Dance
BFA in Acting, Drama Education, Design, Technology and Dance
MA in Teacher Training, Theatre History and Critici m
MFA in Acting, Directing, Design: costumes, lights, cenery, Creative
Drama & Children's Theatre, and Playwriting
PhD in Theatre History and Criticism and Dramatic Text and Criticism

for more information:
Department of Drama
The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, Texas 78712

ra
24

1991

SPRING

TD&T

Department of Drama
College of Fine Am
The L"ni\·crsiry of T'cXJS

Jt

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Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Theatre Design & Technology - Spring 1991
