Community Theater Season Selection Help

I'm the artistic director of a community theatre in a fairly conservative Midwestern town. The board I serve under has criticized previous shows and proposals for their lack of commercial appeal and for being too avant garde or unknown to the general public. Some previous productions include The Sound of Music, Into the Woods, Steel Magnolias, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Gypsy, Nunsense, MASH, Arsenic & Old Lace, The Diary of Anne Frank, Lend Me a Tenor, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum, Chicago, Same Time Next Year, and we've pretty much drained the Neil Simon well dry. I feel like we've done most of the shows people have heard of. My predecessor's formula was to usually try to balance out our 4 show season with a well known play (usu. a comedy), a lesser known play (usu. something that we can sink our teeth into artistically), a musical (title recognition varying - everybody here knows R&H, nobody knows Sondheim) and then rake in money with Christmas shows of varying degrees of quality - people come no matter what.

My question is does anyone have any suggestions of shows (specifically plays though I might be open to musicals depending on the suggested show) with mass appeal to a typical Midwestern small town audience. We've been slowly training our audiences from only wanting broad comedies to now coming see any type of show we produce with great success but we just doubled our performances to two weekends and I feel like we're back at square one. What shows can we do that might draw audiences based on title alone? Similar to Steel Magnolias, MASH, and The Sound of Music where presales were strong based on audiences knowledge of the material? Suggestions?

If you've done "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," which is certainly more sophisticated fare in terms of content, how about dipping into other Williams? "The Rose Tattoo" remains a lovely play. And "Night of the Iguana" has no objectionable language. But John Guare is another idea. What about "House of Blue Leaves"? What about any of the works of Horton Foote? Google him and look through the list. I'd highly recommend "Dividing the Estate," They are really family centric, without profanity, and have equal parts charm and gravitas.

Updated On: 10/17/15 at 08:09 PM

Updated On: 10/18/15 at 12:21 AM

Surely you, as director of the company, must already know these titles at least as well as your audience. So I'm a bit confused why you are asking for help in identifying some fairly well known plays.

But here's a somewhat random list for your consideration (perhaps not all, but surely some might work for your company):

Butterflies are Free
Cactus Flower
The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man in the Moon Marigolds
Marvin's Room
August: Osage County
The Nerd
The Foreigner

Ten Angry Men
Blithe Spirit
Private Lives
Hay Fever
The Children's Hour
The Little Foxes
A Raisin in the Sun
Golden Boy
Pygmalion
Stage Door
The Royal Family
M. Butterfly
You Can't Take It With You
The Front Page
The Country Girl
Golden Boy
Awake and Sing
Glengarry Glenn Ross
Doubt
Wit
Fences
The Piano Lesson
The House of Blue Leaves
Six Degrees of Separation
The Miracle Worker
Mr. Roberts
Bus Stop
Picnic
The Dark at the Top of the Stairs
Look Back in Anger
Look Homeward, Angel
The Subject Was Roses
Who's Afraid of Viginia Woolf?
A Delicate Balance
A Doll's House
Hedda Gabler
Luv
Becket
Dancing at Lugnasa
Luther
A Thousand Clowns
Sleuth
Lettice and Lovage
Da
Deathtrap
Master Class

The Mousetrap
The Gin Game
The Last Night of Ballyhoo
Driving Miss Daisy
The Norman Conquests
Les Liaisons Dangereuses
The Lion in Winter
Whose Life is It Anyway?
I'm Not Rappaport
'night, Mother
Noises Off
Prelude to a Kiss
The Sisters Rosensweig

The Heidi Cronicles
God of Carnage

Art
Proof
Frost/Nixon
Reasons to Be Pretty
Enchanted April
Other Desert Cities

Clybourne Park
Night Must Fall
Crimes of the Heart

Updated On: 10/19/15 at 09:02 AM

"Surely you, as director of the company, must already know these titles at least as well as your audience. So I'm a bit confused why you are asking for help in identifying some fairly well known plays."

I'm hoping someone might post something that has slipped my mind. Your list is fairly exhaustive and includes titles we've already produced (The Nerd, Bus Stop, Driving Miss Daisy, Twelve Angry Men, Blithe Spirit) shows we can't produce logistically (we only have about 4 African American performers in our company right now and no Latino or Asian performers - however, broadening our casting pool is a priority of mine so just putting a show where we would be forced to go out and find diverse performers may be something to consider) and a few that are just too "out there" for our conservative area.

Like I said in my previous post, we did a good job of slowly training our audience to try different types of theatre but the added performances have brought new demands and new theatergoers so we are pretty much starting over. I fear that we are out of shows like MASH, Steel Magnolias, and Driving Miss Daisy that draw audiences by name recognition alone and are general crowd pleasers, the success of which allow us to produce a show like The Little Foxes or Doubt.

Of Mice and Men is a show I'd like to do but a neighboring company did it last season so I'll probably hold off. Inherit the Wind is a show I think our audience might respond to that I'm considering right now.

The Miracle Worker is a title I hadn't thought about. I'll have to give it a read as it's been a few years. Thanks for the suggestion and the whole list. There are a number of shows on there that I'd love to do but I just don't see them happening until we've strengthened our audience base to support two weekend performances of any show we produce.

Auggie27 said: "If you've done "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof," which is certainly more sophisticated fare in terms of content, how about dipping into other Williams? "The Rose Tattoo" remains a lovely play. And "Night of the Iguana" has no objectionable language. But John Guare is another idea. What about "House of Blue Leaves"? What about any of the works of Horton Foote? Google him and look through the list. I'd highly recommend "Dividing the Estate," They are really family centric, without profanity, and have equal parts charm and gravitas.

Cat was kind of at our peak. We had grown been slowly evolving our seasons so that our audience knew that they were going to see a quality production no matter what the show was and trusted us enough to come even if it sounded like something they may not be interested in. It was exciting to have so many people afterwards say that they didn't think they like dramas but that they really enjoyed that show and they looked forward to seeing similar shows. However, since then demand has grown and we added a second weekend. That demand was not necessarily as trusting an audience and the second weekend was more than demand called for so we are now in the position of marketing for and to a new audience which means doing what we did in the beginning lots of broad comedies and well known titles and slowly working our way towards shows with some heft to them.

"

Tom Jones
Big River
The Fantasticks
I Do! I Do!
Paint Your Wagon
110 in the Shade
The Pajama Game
Little Me
She Loves Me
The Dinner Party
Proposals
Sweet Charity
Guys and Dolls
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying
Best Little Whorehouse in Texas
Deathtrap
Anything Goes
Company
A Doll's House
The Murder Room
An Inspector Calls
Lend Me a Tenor
Lettice and Lovage
Prelude to a Kiss
The Last Night of Ballyhoo
Art
Proof
The Tale of the Allergist's Wife
Enchanted April
Frozen
Rabbit Hole
The Seafarer
God of Carnage
Time Stands Still
Good People
Other Desert Cities