Can a Theatre Company Lead Change?

HowlRound Theatre Commons: For as long as I can remember, I have had a compulsive habit of counting the number of not-white and not-old people in the audience every time I go to the theatre. Over the years, the trend I’ve observed is pretty consistent: the larger and more prestigious the stage, the more likely the casts are to be white, the director to be male, and the audiences to be older and wealthier. This staggering lack of diversity, both on stage and in house, has struck me as a stark contrast to the rest of Toronto, often called the most multicultural city in the world. I realize that for most people reading this, that won’t be a particularly shocking observation; this seems to be a common trend across North America. But for me, a Pakistani-born immigrant middle-class millennial, I still find it shocking on a daily basis.