Thought Provoking Theater

An letter to the editor is on-line at the Trib that argues that TAG fell through because they moved away from thought-provoking and controversial theater.

The author, Heidi Erdmann, writes, "It is curious to me that Tacoma has embraced the Grand Cinema, which has had its fair share of provocative films, but has not been able to replicate the formula for theater."

I might be a good choice to respond to this observation.

She's right on. The Grand can be a lot more provocative than TAG ever could be. From "Brokeback Mountain" to NC-17 films like "The Dreamers" that the Grand played in 2004, a couple weeks before I became the Grand's manager. But TAG could never have gotten away with showing their theatrical equivalent. Why?

First, for as much as I love movies, I think it's important to note that live theater has a lot more intimacy that even the small theaters of the Grand. A nude man on a screen and a nude man 20 feet from you will cause very different reactions. A string of obscenities can be hilarious in a movie but appalling on stage if not handled just right. Because of the distance, cinema I feel can be allowed to be more provocative.

Second, the Grand benefits from millions of dollars of marketing, not to mention press and star power. Controversial films, films up for Oscars, and the movie industry in general get a lot written about them and they can afford a lot of money spent on advertising. I may be hard pressed to go see a controversial play, but a controversial movie that everyone's talking about with Heath Ledger is a different thing.

Third, and this is important, people who got offended at the Grand (and I will attest that a lot of people did) weren't necessarily mad at the Grand because of it. After all, we didn't make the movies. Miramax, Fox Searchlight, or Warner Independent did. But TAG put on its shows and if they offended people, those who were offended were likely mad at TAG. In the theater, a single show can cause donations could be pulled and season tickets not to be renewed, but people seldom stopped coming to the Grand because one movie offended them.

On top of that, TAG put on 5 plays a year. The Grand does about 70 movies in a year if you count the revivals. That means that the Grand can appeal to a lot of people and try to have something for everyone. Two women in their 70s can go see "Ladies in Lavender" and teenagers can see "Napoleon Dynamite" and everyone's happy.

At the Horatio, I have tried to take some lessons from both TAG and the Grand. From the Grand, I learned that Heidi is right -- people in Tacoma are willing to see provocative, intelligent art, and prove it by patronizing the Grand. And from TAG I've learned that if you're going to do that, you have to manage expectations. In this case, it means that when I launched the Horatio it was made very clear that we wanted to push the envelope. The play selections so far haven't exactly been offensive (I'd give both a solid PG rating) but they are becoming more so. "Stones in his Pockets" in June would be a mild R for language, and "Topdog/Underdog" in the fall will be a hard R.

Anyway, I thought Heidi's letter was worth talking about for a bit because it was so close to comments I've heard for the last few months.