---

BY ANNE COLEMAN

In print | Published January 28, 2010

Last Friday, the Wall Street Journal ran an article titled “Are Broadway Previews Outdated?” which explored the ways in which amateur theater bloggers and soaring ticket prices have rendered the Broadway preview superfluous. What the article did not discuss was the way in which this new generation of outspoken theatergoers is lending a hand by speaking up.

The purpose of the preview is to give the director and the actors a chance to see how an audience will respond to their work, and to make changes accordingly. After a show officially opens in any equity theater, the actors’ and stage managers’ contracts prevent the director from making any further changes. Without a preview, there would be no opportunity for fine-tuning. Ellen Gamerman, who authored the piece, is not saying the previews aren’t useful for the cast and crew; in fact, she points to several shows, which have greatly improved during previews. Rather, what Gamerman is suggesting is that the hazards of allowing a plugged-in, modern audience to see a show before it is ‘ready’ overshadow the benefits of seeing a live audience react. What Gamerman neglects to mention, however, is that the bloggers and Internet peanut gallery are doing exactly what a preview audience is supposed to do. They are providing a detailed response, one that is more nuanced than any survey could capture and more precise data than any director can collect with simple observation. Audience members who go home to report on line flubs and set issues do the show no great service—undoubtedly someone else has noticed them as well—but the other moments they remember, the images and actions that stuck with them, and the emotions they express are useful details for a savvy director.

To those who fret that early critical comments on the web will adversely affect ticket sales and attendance, let the words credited to showman P.T. Barnum ring clear: “all publicity is good publicity.” Most people are still well enough informed about the hazards of the Internet that they understand the difference between an anonymous comment on BroadwayWorld.com and the opinions expressed by a review in the New York Times. If they take the comments with a grain of salt, then all the blogger has done is make the show better known.

Hopefully, those readers also understand that the experience of sitting behind a director and choreographer who are wildly writing notes by flashlight is an experience strictly reserved for one or two (un)lucky guests during early previews—a problem which can, incidentally, be remedied at virtually every preview by an usher, since extra seats are always kept empty in previews, for financial backers and industry big-wigs who decide to swing by.

Another concern that audiences and producers face is the question of preview pricing. Previews are just as taxing on the cast and crew as long-running shows, if not more so, and a celebrity does not cease to be a celebrity if they forget a lyric from time to time. In addition, while some shows have made great strides during the preview period, the majority of the show will resemble the end result, if only because of time constraints. To charge full price for a show in its first few days of previews may be unreasonable, but as the opening night approaches, it no longer makes sense to offer a discount, and there will always be people willing to pay to be in on the next big thing.

When tourists visit Manhattan and want to see a show, they are often looking for more than just a great production. Often, they are hoping to see the thing that everyone has been talking about, or to beat their friends to the punch by seeing a show before anyone else. If a trip to New York happens to line up with previews for a show, tourists have the chance to become an industry insider, even if only for a few days. Imagine the satisfaction they might feel when a review shows up in the paper a week later and they can disagree with the critic and picture the moments mentioned therein. To pay the same price for the experience one week that someone else has paid for the following week is no injustice – it’s just a matter of scheduling.

Moreover, if a tourist unwittingly stumbles into a preview and has a bad experience, it is regrettable, but it is more than likely their own fault. Tickets sold online by the theater always put the word “preview” in italics and when buying in person the box office has a large sign proclaiming the opening date and that the show is in previews. For purchases over the phone, employees are trained to confirm that the purchaser wants to attend a preview. Even the TKTS website (the discount ticket seller run by the Theatre Development Fund) carefully explains previews, when they rarely have preview tickets available. Only a scalper could get away with hiding the fact that a show is a preview, and those who buy tickets from scalpers are already taking a risk.

Gamerman is worried about theater becoming too affected by popular opinion, but it is far better to have conversations about theater turning viral than to have them stop altogether. At least with this trend, the fears that have plagued the theater business since the advent of film can be momentarily set aside: there is still a place for theater, amidst all this new-fangled technology.

---

« RETURN TO LIVING & ARTS

« PREV ARTICLE | NEXT ARTICLE »