Breaking Character: A year and a half ago, I was at lunch with a friend who happens to run a gay porn studio with a great midtown-Manhattan location. It had become tradition for me to hound him about the underutilized potential of his space every time we hung out. “We’ve got a year left on the lease,” he told me. “I just feel like I should give you a key and tell you that you can do whatever you want in the back.” I replied, “If you’re serious, I will make something happen.”
After conferring with a few close collaborators, I emailed my circle of friends to announce that I was building a black box theatre in the back of a gay porn studio just off Times Square. This said black box theatre would be dedicated to the development of new musicals: The Musical Theatre Factory (MTF). The porn company agreed to underwrite the materials for the renovation with an interest-free loan if I could provide the volunteer labor to pull off the construction.
6 comments:
This is an interesting place, not because it is in the back of a gay porn studio, although I can only imagine that would be like. The assembly line process is something to think about because it seems like a good test for a musical as well as a great way to develop said musical. Starting with an open mic night type deal is a pretty creative way to get audience feedback about songs, although without musical context I would imagine making the audience, ‘get it’ is more difficult. But then again that is also a good test for a musical, the sound track should sound good and make sense without watching the show because sound track sales can be a successful point of income for any musical. It seems to take about a year for a musical to get to the full production phase, and the only reason I point it out is that this group seems to be working on one at a time. I wonder how long that will last or if they will try and expand the group to be more fruitful.
There’s something about this article that’s both exciting and seems a little risky. I am in love with the serendipitous nature of how this ‘Factory’ came about. What a funny story to tell at dinner party’s; “So one day I was out with my friend who runs a gay porn studio…” It seems mildly iconic yet also unexpected and taboo. Regardless, I enjoy the message of ending the cycle of economic dependency and creating a space where artists and theatre makers can create with reckless abandon. A place where experimentation and rigor are of the utmost (quiet hilarious when you remember that this is all happening in a porn studio). There is such novelty in this porn studio thing, I can barely get over it myself. But really, this is great. The musical theatre factory could not be in a better place either. It’s in midtown Manhattan, near Times Square, which is great proximity to the Great White Way. I wonder if there will be small scale productions associated with each of these shows, or if it’s going to be a more exclusive in-house showing type of thing. I would love to go and see what they are creating and playing around with.
This article is so interesting because it's so incredibly unique. Sure it's in the back of a gay porn shop, and that might raise some eye brows in the corporate world but I love how it's redefining theater, and what we know if the collaborative process. The concept of the assembly line is so great, and it really lends itself to the amount of editing a show goes through, and the amount of interaction different people involved in the show have. I wish as community we could follow this lead, and start to take the mass money out of theater, and stop creating theatrical machines that can never fail because of the amount of money we put into them. We all got into this business because we love it, and it's certainly not for the money, so it's time that we start doing art for the sake of art, and not for the financial profit that it has the ability to produce.
Even though I felt like this article was just an ad for this company, and that it was possible that everything they were saying was a lie to make themselves sound better, I do think The Musical Theatre Factory had some very good ideas about creation. I have yet to experience an environment where I felt one hundred percent comfortable creating. Even when it is just me writing with one other person, someone who was close to me, I was still pretty scared to say something stupid and make a wrong or incorrect decision. That is not a safe space to create in, and in the end, the piece ended up being not what I wanted it to be at all. I loved MTF’s story about how they were able to get their space, that totally sounds like something me, as well as a lot of other directors, are going to need to do in the future.
I think the idea of artists-as-laborers is a great concept, don't really get why he kept calling it Marxist, though. He mentioned politics very often, especially in reference to "star-fucking," in which people will try and attract big names to be in their new musicals. But in that vein, why should an artist doing art for arts sake be interested in that? If the idea is that the artists are the laborers and don't subscribe to any huge conglomerate (except the big name porn studio that financed the theater?), why should someone putting on a musical here desire the attention of the people they are trying to distance themselves from? That part just bugged me a little bit. All in all, seems like a very cool organization.
Though this article serves as an advertisement for The Musical Theatre Factory, I feel MTF has struck a chord in new theatre. We always hear about creating theatre in non-theatre spaces. Here they've taken it to a whole new level. The idea of producing theatre in a porn studio is hilarious. Its a conversation starter for sure. But in all seriousness, this article does a great job of outlining how much work and preparation goes into producing a new musical. I am always impressed with someones ability to generate new theatre.
I am so happy to hear that a new organization like this is taking off, but it seems a little to good to be true that the building of the theatre came with free labor, but some peoples networks are bigger than others.
Hopefully, MTF will generate quality theatre because it is in such a great location. Being in the heart of NYC, MTF has the ability to make a huge impact on the community, and seriously expand.
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