- Cheaper tickets would make me Les Miserable.
(Originally published on Theatrehead.com)
Why pay all that money for theater when movie tickets are still under ten bucks? Sure, we in the theater community have lots of pompous reasons we think theater is superior to the movies, but most of the public, especially the dating public (when the price of an evening usually doubles for one of the participants) doesn�t see much difference between plays and movies except the price and the price difference is ridiculous. And in spite of the fact that I�m a theater guy, I have to admit, I�m with them on this one.
How much are theater tickets now, two-hundred, three-hundred dollars? I have no idea, because I don�t go to theater any more. The last time I paid to see a big show, I paid sixty bucks a seat to take some woman to Stomp hoping to impress her, except the sixty dollar seats were actually the cheap seats and there was no show, just a bunch of homeless people banging on garbage cans. I never got a second date. And I don�t blame her for running away screaming, why wouldn�t she with me displaying such pathetic financial sense? For the hundred and twenty I spent on that crappy show I could�ve bought a VCR and rented twenty movies that were actually entertaining. And I�d still have the VCR to show for it. I walked out of Stomp with nothing but a headache and a look of scorn from my date.
So if I swear off the overpriced Broadway touring show crapola sliming through town, what alternatives do I have for dating (since I don�t swing dance)? The next price level down is the commercially bloated hack-houses like the Guthrie and the Jeune Lune � still too expensive to risk another dating disaster in my opinion, and too many idiots in fake furs and overpriced perfume clogging the lobby. Plus the artistic tribes in these places are so delighted with their own little self-congratulatory artistic universe, (granted, sometimes with good reason) they�re not interested so much in pleasing or entertaining the audience as they are in telling the audience what�s hip and what�s art. And the Edina/Minnetonka elite are more than happy to throw money at the artists to be thus educated and drive away from it feeling like real classy art afficianados.
So the next step down in admission dollars is the mid-priced theaters like Park Square and the History Theater. Very good theater about nothing in particular. These theaters approach affordable with prices for decent seats getting closer to twenty bucks, but for the cardboard, Twinkie fluff plays that they produce, in large theaters that lack the intimacy that makes theater unique, you can get just as enlightened going to an arthouse movie for a quarter of the price. And this leaves money to get your date some ice cream after the show.
The next tier is the up-and-coming independent and experimental theaters. The prices are usually in the teens and the shows can be great. The problem is, they can also be hideous. With such a short track record, it�s hard to know whether you�re going to get a spot-on radical adaptation of a classic Greek tragedy, or three guys in nun outfits and blue face paint masturbating a giant phallus while singing �You Light Up My Life� in German. Now that�s a mood killer on any date.
Then of course there�s community theater.
Beyond that, the only theater available for ten bucks or less is cabaret theater and the Fringe Festival. Great stuff with lots of hidden treasures, but not very consistent or predictable for dating, and depending on the time of year, it can be pretty slim pickings, unless your date LOVES drag shows. Now, I don�t need an economics explanation to understand WHY theater costs more than movies. I know there�s little we can do to bring the ticket costs down. Theater actors are already shafted when it comes to money. So what can we do with the present system to make theater worth the big buck in the eyes of the consumer?
STADUM SEATING � those seats are awesome. And no smelly old person with a hat will block your view.
PREVIEWS � Have some previews of upcoming theater shows � it�s fast-paced and gives people time to get some popcorn.
MORE NUDITY � Nudity has always been okay where art is concerned, so we should be providing more nudity than Hollywood anyway, after all, we�re not subject to the MPAA and since the NEA doesn�t give us any more money, we don�t have to kiss their ass either. Now I�m not recommending hiring busty bimbos and chisled himbos to replace the real actors, there�s already too much of that, but skin is skin, baby, so let�s all take it off!
MORE SEX! - How about a little subliminal suggestion? If you think advertisers don�t do that anymore since it�s illegal, take a good look at the ice chunks on the next soft drink machine you see. Now, theatrical designers are always spackling and texturing everything, there�s no reason we can�t throw in a few images here and there. Some of those cycloramas are big enough to include an image of a thirty or forty-foot penis. Now that�ll keep ME comin� back! I mean� well not me, but� people in general.
Yeah!
-E.A.P