NOTE: The writing below does not necessarily reflect my current views. I include it to show where my mind was at the time and share those views with you.

RECENT THOUGHTS ON THE THEATRE IN OUR COMMUNITIES

By Brad McEntire (March 2002)

I recently returned from New York. I was there just for a weekend and got a chance to talk shop with some of my NYC colleagues. They are, basically, doing the same thing I'm doing here in Texas. Creating and presenting theatre to a brave, loyal, and gradually expanding community of patrons. Amidst much talk and drink the subject of "Is the theatre dying?" came up. It always does. How come no one ever asks this about any other art form? Why is it that films are never "dying" or literature or music? The whole notion that an entire art form (especially the root art form: the original one) can just die out is, frankly, absurd. But it got me to thinking all the same. Is the theatre in our lives, in our communities really fading? Are our connections to one another through social and cultural institutions really on the wane or is this just the pendulum swinging once more?

Robert Putnam, a Harvard professor whose book Bowling Alone (Simon and Schuster) points to studies that show, in a civic community, a high degree of social connection encourages more productive workers, discourages depression and illness, and makes government more efficient. Communities with a variety of civic and social groups (like theatre companies) as well as a network of informal social connections also tend to have lower rates of crime, teenage pregnancy, and child abuse. These correlations between social activity and a healthy community are not illogical. Friends, family and those we share interests and communal activities with are the ones who cheer us up when we feel down, bring us chicken soup when we are sick, and help us with job leads when we are unemployed. The stronger your social network, the easier it is to manage when times are difficult.

Unfortunately, for many Americans in today's fast-paced society this network is weaker than it was for their parents. Bowling Alone reports decades of social surveys showing that Americans today spend about 35% less time visiting and engaging in social and/or cultural activities with friends than they did 30 years ago. U.S. families have dinner together only two-thirds as often as they did in the 1960s. Group membership, voter participation, team sports, attendance to performance arts, picnics- in fact, practically anything that involves togetherness in groups- appears to have suffered a steep decline. Putnam cites several trends. One is seeking entertainment on television, which he terms "lethal to social connection."

In relation to this, I offer the following observation as well: how many people can sit in front of a computer screen? As our root medias switch (storytelling to books, books to radio, radio to television, television to the internet, and so forth) our sense of social interaction, our sense of community, alters and ultimately seems to be in decline. The theatre offers a place still, a reliable "throwback" to a more communal time. A time when people actually gathered together to share an experience. Theatre is a key to our social connections since that is, in essence, all it is. People gathering to watch, listen, and experience other people telling stories and relating the light and the dark of what it is to be a human being.

I hope you will join us at Audacity in celebration of our communal selves. Laugh, cry, get angry or frustrated, or enlightened, or excited, or joyous at one of our productions. If you don't attend an Audacity Production, at least attend another theatre nearby. Be part of the cultural and true social life in your community.

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