onstagepittsburgh.com: Launching for the 2024 are three “Remove the Barriers” initiatives that will include parking and transportation to and from four suburban areas, family discounts and childcare for specific performances among PCLO shows: West Side Story, The Music Man and The Color Purple at the Benedum Center, Seussical at the Byham Theater and Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill and Young Frankenstein at the Greer Cabaret Theater.
2 comments:
Wow, this initiative from Pittsburgh CLO seems great. It appears well thought out and has the potential to actually work. They have obviously been listening to their patrons and their community. The transportation side will be quite interesting, my main concerns as a patron would be how long it would take to get back to my vehicle and does it affect my ability to get food downtown prior to the show. For myself I’m curious if PCLO is paying for the trolleys or if it is an in-kind donation from the trolley company. The childcare I think is a great idea, though the no children under 3 is a little odd to me. So parents with young children would still have to find a babysitter. I love the adding of $10 kids tickets if you buy a full price ticket. It will allow parents to bring their kids to see shows without a massive additional cost. I will be curious to see the outcome of this a few years from now.
I think it is so important that we have programs like this appearing more and more at local levels. At a time where inflation is so high right now, and people are finding it harder to spend extra money on luxuries like the theatre. Especially since tickets are becoming more and more expensive at a staggering rate, having programs in place that help and encourage your local community to attend the arts is so important. Theater has always been rooted in classism and elitism in America, and in order to foster a truly diverse community of audiences, there needs to be more systems in place like this one to help others to experience live theater. I have been feeling the repercussions of this with concert tickets as well, paying $200 for artists in relatively small venues when it used to be around $50 maybe, or less depending on how far back you look.
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