How many feathers can we ruffle with a notion that the argument is not whether art is entertainment, but rather, does your audience care?
For years, we have tried to find relevance hiding behind a notion that as arts producers, we are enlightening the masses, serving a great social conscience and reflecting life back to ourselves to create dialogue... but are we really? Or are we offering up a product directed to a few, wrapping it in art and then bemoaning the decrease in audience numbers... are we too arrogant?
Who has these conversations? Is anyone talking about this? I used to grit my teeth at the thought of dinner theatre - having rejected it as artistic drivel... nothing artistic comes from caesar salad... but why do people flock to these shows? Is it accessibility? Is it a removal of class? Is it that they know "how" to attend?
If it's popular, does it mean it's entertainment? If it's entertainment, does that mean we've sold out? And if we are striving for increased revenue due to increases in our audience - aren't we all trying to sell out?
Just thinking out loud...
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ReplyDeleteMagicMo, you ask if it's a removal of class for people to flock to the dinner theatres instead of attending a regular theatrical performance. I think you're right, in the sense that people are so comfortable with having someone else take care of them - that it's "convenient" to attend - that they find it more entertaining to have the whole package. The entertainment doesn't come from the productions themselves, rather the packaging of them. Look at a symphony, where a production like "Mozart on the Mountain" draws thousands of people outdoors for the same music and the same composers that only attract maybe 300 people on an evening at a concert hall. Why is there such a discrepancy when it's the same music and same musicians playing? The only thing different is perhaps the "make a day of it" packaging of the event.
ReplyDeleteI do think, however, that too much of that kind of convenience will lead to humans not thinking for themselves, and simply let someone else do it for them. However one defines art, it makes people think, question, and rethink, no matter how ugly or beautiful or profound or annoying the subject matter. Is it such a bad thing, to want people to think for themselves? To discover, to explore and to evolve? How else does the human race move forward? And in that case, class should be determined by a person's intellect, rather than how much money they have. And the more art there is out there to make people think, and realize that perhaps the world does not revolve around them, then so much better the world, and the human race, might be.