Mike Daisey Responds to Tampa Bay Artistic Director Todd Olson | DENNIS BAKER LLC:
Many theaters with education departments hire teaching artists. Why don’t they offer them a contract in a show as well to help supplement the little money they are paid as teachers? No one is arguing that a theater does not need a staff, but why continue to separate staff members and artists? If a theater has a couple of actors within their staff, then in theory, they also have a resident acting company. The theater can build seasons around those actors to ensure that they have an acting job year after year and a marketing pitch for audiences to come back and see their favorite actors in different roles. This might not be as sexy as bringing in a company of actors from New York, but I know many talented actors who would love to work consistently in a theater and would be willing to do both staff and artistic jobs. I hope it would be an honor for an artistic director to give an artist health benefits, a consistent paycheck, and a deeper connection to the theater, other staff members and its audience by also having them work in other positions.
I think a major point in HTFA is that people should come first before any theater building. I think this includes the staff. To sustain a theater as artistic director the real job is the care of the people. In this hard economic time budgets are being cut, so how can one look to sustain both staff and artists, by bringing both to the table in multi-faceted roles.
6:46 PM
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