By William S. E. Coleman
The regional theatre produces new plays. Many even seek new plays through competitions and calls for plays—some of which have been posted in our recent news letters.
What should you write for this market? Think low budget. Then think it again. Use lights and sound, but keep your set requirements to a minimum. Keep your cast size under ten – three to five is even better. Think young if you are aiming at college and university theatre. Young is also important even in regional Equity theatres since their companies tend to be young.
If you are writing for the educational theatre at any level, write roles for women. University and college theatre departments often have three women for every one man enrolled, the reverse of the ratio used by most playwrights. A good play with six women and one or two men is pure gold.
My new play Life Study, for instance, was conceived to be played by one man and six women. To span the age range of the male character three men are being used—still a very good three to six ratio.
Write great roles, roles that actors want to play and directors want to direct. And look at the world in a unique fresh manner. Don't be afraid of boulevard comedies and farces—and mysteries. They are in limited supply and audiences are weary of many of the old classics. Dinner theatres are starving for them.
As a director working within a university theatre, we constantly look for worthy plays that will challenge ourselves, our actors and our audiences. We do not do boulevard theatre. Large casts are permissible, if there is a strong ratio of females. New plays tend to get low budgets. Imaginative use of theatre is a must.
My wife and I have a musical (drama, not comedy) on our desks that used six women and four men, a unit set, and a jazz combo for accompaniment. There is a great need in dinner theatres for small scale musicals. There are only so many Stop the Worlds and Fantasticks. Create a good intimate musical and you'll be in business for a very long time.
The educational theatre market is the hardest to tap. Drake does not seek outside new plays. If we did, we'd be inundated with two or three hundred of them. Instead, we find new plays, either from within—students or faculty—or by references from people we know. The pay? Standard royalty. Sorry, that's all we've got. Other university theatres function in a similar manner.