Stage Directions: The American Conservatory Theater launched Stage Coach, a mobile pop-up theatre in San Francisco. Stage Coach will provide stand-alone theatrical experiences at street fairs and festivals throughout the city, as well as establish ongoing residencies in three San Francisco neighborhoods: Central Market/Tenderloin; Bayview/Hunter’s Point; and Mission/Excelsior. The program is made possible by a $600,000 grant from The James Irvine Foundation.
3 comments:
This past summer, I worked for an event management and design firm based in Brooklyn. Over half of the events I worked on were "pop up events." The idea of the pop up has become increasingly more popular in the past few years. Although the trend may have started with food trucks and souvenir stands, it has quickly spread to almost every industry. I think the idea of creating theater pop up spaces is brilliant for a few reasons. First, many people do not go to the theater because they do not want to commit to sitting in a room for 2-3 hours. By bringing theater experiences out into the world, this gives people the chance to "take it or leave it." Second, theater pop ups have the ability to reach audiences that they do not necessarily reach in their typical seasons. Lastly, taking theater and brining it out into the world is an incredible marketing strategy. Even if the people who come in contact with this pop up do not enjoy it, they are likely to tell their friends about it. Pop ups are not only trendy, but they also bring fantastic publicity and marketing opportunities. Perhaps it is time for others in the industry to follow in the American Conservatory Theater's footsteps and jump on the bandwagon.
I was really hoping that they would be individual horse drawn stage coaches where you could watch a private show. However, what they actually are seems to be very reminiscent of the manner in which commedia dell'arte troupes moved around and performed our of the back of wagons that would sometimes fold down into stages. I hope they make the connection and perform a similar event in the streets of San Fran.
I think this is a huge advancement in the progression of introducing theatre to new audiences, one of the most important goals of our generation and every generation before us. Although it sounds like an interesting concept, this is actually modeled on some of the very first theaters in Europe, when traveling groups would go around the countries on the carts, lay down one of the walls and form a stage as they went from town to town. It is interesting to see an old idea come back to modern day and how it has evolved. It also for some reason reminds me of a food truck, bringing the product to the consumer directly.
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