Chad Jones Jumps the Fence

The news that Chad Jones, former theatre critic at Oakland Tribune and the man behind the TheaterDogs, “jumped the fence” to become the new communications manager at Berkeley Rep has been flying around email inboxes and theatre lobbies. The obvious questions come to mind, specifically: Will he still write TheaterDogs? Will he still freelance for the Chronicle (and Theatre Bay Area, for that matter)? But the bigger question seems to be what happens to a theatre critic once he or she starts working for a theatre company? Traditional thinking says that once the critic jumps the fence, he can’t jump back.

Now, Chad hasn’t been the first critic to jump the fence, so his move is by no means groundbreaking. But most of us can’t think of another high-profile critic who’s done so in the past several years. So, while I wonder what will happen to TheaterDogs and all that, what I think about more is what a move like his says about the current world of arts journalism, both online and print. What does it mean when one of the Bay Area’s best theatre critics, one of the best theatre writers and the most successful (in terms of readership) local theatre blogger chooses a fulltime job at a theatre company, leaving the journalism career he built up over decades?

Let’s get two things out of the way: I am not criticizing Chad’s decision, and I’m not belittling fulltime jobs at theatre companies.

What I am wondering is if the journalism is changing/imploding so quickly that the traditional lines between journalists and their subjects (theatre companies) are blurring. In his Diacritical blog at ArtsJournal, editor Douglas McLennan asked, back in April: “Why don’t arts organizations have critics in residence?” Theatre companies turn more to Facebook, Twitter and other social media (and their own sites and e-communications, I hope) to communicate with their audiences because they can no longer rely on newspaper reviews and features—yet a 2008 Patron Mail survey showed that reading arts features was the third most-popular thing people did online, after reading email and searching Google. And it’s not news that laid-off journalists—even those with huge national bylines—are starting their own blogs and not getting paid for them because they feel a responsibility to, to the best of their ability, keep important stories in the public discourse. That’s what TheaterDogs is all about.

You know, all the layoffs at our local papers do hurt theatre companies in terms of coverage, but if more of these journalists started working at theatre companies like Chad has, it could be a huge asset to the companies. Berkeley Rep’s press release announcing Chad’s appointment noted that he’s seen every show at Berkeley Rep except one in the past 12 years. What company wouldn’t want a talented writer, who’s been writing for local audiences, with that kind of knowledge about their productions on their staff?

Filling in the Theatre Coverage Gap

This morning, in the wake of the Chronicle's threatened demise, a local theatre publicist sent me an email wondering if it was, in a nutshell, far-fetched that Theatre Bay Area's site could be the local touchstone for theatre news and coverage.

Funny you should ask.

As many in the theatre community know, Theatre Bay Area has been planning, for at least a year, on a major site overhaul. We recognized many months ago that we have an opportunity to fill in the gaps in mainstream media coverage. Unlike many other local sites, that mostly just sell tickets or list shows, Theatre Bay Area has offered real coverage of local theatre through the features and Editors' Picks in the magazine, and in the past several years I've attracted prominent theatre writers like Chad Jones, Randy Gener, Sam Hurwitt and many more, and I pay them.

The magazine offers both industry content and what I like to call "patron-friendly" content. A prominent arts editor at the Chronicle recently told me how impressive the magazine is and that it's "a must read, not only for theatre people, but for anyone interested in theatre." We have the opportunity to distribute this content across multiple platforms: the magazine, our site and our two e-blasts (one for members and one for patrons). We've been posting magazine features to the site for years, and we've started including Editors' Picks and sections of articles (with links to the complete article on our site) in the Theatregoer e-blast.

What Theatre Bay Area needs is a major site overhaul. We would like to become a theatre news portal for both people interested in making theatre and people interested in going to theatre. I want to increase our theatre coverage both online and in the magazine. Theatre Bay Area currently has a major proposal into the NEA for such a site overhaul, but you know the grant timeline at the NEA is rather long. We'll have a better idea of the outcome in a couple of months, but we do have pages and pages of plans and budgets. But the bottom line is that to do this right, we need financial resources.

But I Like Ink on My Fingers

Dwindling arts coverage and the decline of print have been issues for years. But with the East Bay Express cutting theatre reviews after today's edition (well, we just heard that it may in fact still continue reviewing but giving those duties to someone in house), and with the SF Weekly cutting theatre critic Chloe Veltman down to two reviews a month, plus the merging of dailies in the East and South Bays, it seems pretty critical now.

The East Bay Express news came within days of Walter Isaacson's appearance on The Daily Show in conjunction with his cover story in Time magazine, "How to Save Your Newspaper." The article recounts what we've all recently learned: newspaper readership is actually higher than it's been in years and there's more demand for content. Problem is, everyone's reading the content on the web for free instead of paying for it (either paying for a print edition or paying an online subscription). Isaacson says the newspapers and magazines did themselves a disservice by putting their content on the web for free years and years ago, when they should have been charging for it. Problem is, the web was so new to the public that the companies couldn't sell online content, and now because no one sells online content, everyone still expects it for free.

Now, Sam and I have been chewing on all this "decline of print" and what it means for theatre companies, and it's a big meal. So I'll offer a side dish: Perhaps we shouldn't be looking to print lovers. See, here's what happens: Isaacson goes on The Daily Show and being a print journalist and author, we know he loves print. So he starts talking, and Jon Stewart, also a print lover, starts agreeing, and they fall into what I've come to hate to hear: "I just love having paper in my hands, I can't read on the screen, I want the ink to rub off on my fingers, oh it's all so romantic" (quotes not exact, obviously). As if these are compelling reasons for people who don't want to pay for content to suddenly start paying for it. So we can get our hands dirty. Here's the thing: I want to hear from people who don't care about print, but who care deeply about online content, on how we should "solve the problem." Last week I saw a young woman on Muni reading Jane Austen on her iPhone. Jane Austen!

But I love print too. And I'm going to get romantic about it and completely negate that last paragraph (or illustrate my point further that print lovers shouldn't be the only ones talking). I love novels and poetry (poetry, a field more marginalized than even theatre) and magazines. In the past couple of years I started collecting vintage paper ephemera. And despite all the talk of the decline of print books and the closing of independent bookstores, I've been buying books at an alarming rate (and joining GoodReads, and getting a library card (SF)), as if a sort of denial was fueling my obsession. Maybe it's because I'm coming to realize that all the assumptions I built my career on are no longer. I thought I could always get paid for being a writer and editor. No, now there are a whole bunch of citizen journalists willing to do that for free. So, I don't need more people who think like me telling me why print is so wonderful--I want to hear from people who don't really care about print but care about content. The catch is, I still want them to pay for it.

In the next week Sam and I will be planning what we hope will be a multi-component feature for the May issue about dwindling arts coverage, what it means for theatre companies and what tactics some are employing to attract new audiences. If you have ideas or comments, and/or your theatre is doing something quite different in online marketing (non-print marketing), let me know.

SF Weekly Cuts Caps

Last week, SF Weekly theatre critic Chloe Veltman says in her personal blog that the Weekly has cut back yet again on theatre coverage. Chloe pens a 1,000-word essay, and some other freelancers offer capsule reviews, which run about 20-300 words. The paper will no longer print capsule reviews in the month of January, a trend that’s likely to continue. Chloe will still write her essay. This means only one review a week.

Now, dwindling arts coverage has been a hot topic for years, and like many in this field, I feel arts coverage should be revived. But I’ll probably go into that more in another post. What I want to talk about here is based on one of Chloe’s comments:

“Small companies in particular rely heavily on reviews not just for selling tickets but also for getting grants. In these tough economic times, the fall-off in media interest is particularly crippling.”

While I think we should always advocate for more coverage, the sad truth is that even in better times (even before 9/11) newspapers were still cutting arts coverage. We made small gains then, but we probably won’t make them now.

Here’s my controversial opinion: Theatre companies should no longer rely on reviews as their main marketing tool. Newspapers are a capsizing ship, and though the ship may be righted again, it’ll still take a lot of time and the ship will still have significant damage, and after restoration, may not even be recognizable as the thing it once was. (Have you heard the Chronicle is planning a massive redesign?) We’ve seen this coming for years, and companies need to create an evacuation plan.

We love to hate the Little Man, yet if we get a good one, we slap him on our promotional materials, and why not? Basically, the companies are dependent on the Man and have little backup plan if they get a bad one, or don’t get one at all. One midsize company was shocked when the Chronicle didn’t review them at all, and their ticket sales plummeted and they had to cancel performances. When I asked them about their marketing plan, it was vague. Now, what kind of investment planner would tell you that your portfolio should only consist of stock from one corporation? No matter if that corporation was Hearst or Village Voice Media.

Sure, it’s easy—and free—to rely on good reviews and the Little Man. But it should only be one piece of your portfolio pie, because if doesn’t perform (so to speak), you’ll go broke.

I also think that foundations shouldn’t place so much emphasis on press, but that’s another topic for another time.

I'd love to hear from companies about the ways their diversifying their marketing. Comment away!

Farewell, Chad

On Sunday, Chad Jones over at Theater Dogs gave us the bittersweet news that he’s moving to Sacramento to take a job as an editor at the Sacramento Bee. (Good to know that at least one “local” paper is hiring.) He told me this a couple of weeks ago, but I waited until he broke the news first.

While I’m sure everyone in the Bay Area theatre scene is thrilled to see that one of our most ardent supporters has a regular paycheck again after being laid off from ANG Newspapers a while back, I know I’m very sorry to see him go. After he left ANG, I snagged him as a freelancer, and he’s contributed some lively and entertaining articles to the magazine, so I’m sad to lose one of my best writers. And his Theater Dogs stands out as, for my money, the best theatre blog in the Bay Area. ANG didn’t know what they had, and when Theater Dogs went independent, it grew to tens of thousands of visits—showing that local audiences are indeed hungry for news other than airheaded celeb news—and gained the respect of local publicists, companies and touring stars. For very little, if any, money, Chad continued to cover local theatre like no one else.

I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of him—I hear he and his husband are renting out, not selling, their gorgeous house—but we’ll certainly miss his blog and articles. (Most big papers don’t like their employees to moonlight.) He says Theater Dogs is going on hiatus; I hope it returns in some form. In the meantime, the rest of us bloggers have some big shoes to fill. Break a leg, Chad!