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Wednesday, September 24, 2025
'Cultural coffin': Pittsburgh's thespians and universities react to theater woes
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: The three Pittsburgh theater companies exploring a possible merger to help keep the lights on in the face of sharply rising costs have postponed a decision until next year.
4 comments:
Emily R
said...
I think this is very interesting, especially since we have just done the Pittsburgh project about these different theaters and organizations. We had talked about the merger and the issue with money within some of the theatres. Now I am being provided with more information that wasn't so clear before. When choosing to go to a school in this industry, I knew that it was going to be hard because the theatre industry is hard. What I mean by that is two things. One hard to get work is very selective, but also hard to get work due to the issue occurring in Pittsburgh. The fact that these theaters may have to close or produce fewer shows is the reality of local theaters today. If the merger does occur, I wonder what changes would be made and how the dynamic of these theaters would change with it. It really is saddening to know that this is occurring and may continue to occur elsewhere due to the hardships within the industry.
Most regional theatres have relied on private donations for a long time. The private philanthropy has allowed many theatres to operate on a red budget for a long time. They spend more money than they bring in without these donations. This allows theatres to not have to put on shows that always guarantee a certain number of ticket sales by their popularity. These new works or underperformed shows bring greater diversity to theatre seasons that are very similar to each other. The lack of support from ticket sales and donations is likely due to the instability in the economy and wild swings in our political climate. Targeted attacks have been made against the little arts funding their way into political propaganda that only supports everything America does. This is also one of the markers of the start of a fascist government. A more stable, prosperous United States that supports all would help fund theatres around the country.
I was pretty surprised to hear to about the postponing of the decisions in regards to the possible merger, especially because the last thing I read about this from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in the article titled “On the brink of ‘financial failure,’ Pittsburgh’s three largest theaters explore a merger” was pretty certain on the decision being made this December. Something in the article that stood out to me was in an infographic laying out how a strong arts and theater scene supports the local economy. A statistic from that infographic that surprised me was that “20% of Park Point conservatory graduates remain in the city as tax-paying residents.” The infographic also mentioned how downtown businesses benefit from university enrollment as students buy from their local businesses. All in all I found it interesting how universities and higher education are so heavily integrated in the arts and theater scene as well as the local economy.
I wasn’t aware that Pittsburgh’s theatre scene was in such a declining circumstance. Upon my arrival to Pittsburgh, I was awed by how much theatre it seemed to have compared to Atlanta, which only had a handful of smaller theaters and one major house downtown (there may have been others that I was not aware of). But to know that it was dramatically bigger a decade ago is astonishing, and really conveys the urgency of the situation. And since the major theatres are hurting and cutting employees and budgets, what situation must the smaller houses be in? It’s also interesting to note how important Carnegie Mellon and the other universities are in Pittsburgh’s theatre economy, with many students and professors involved professionally. I do wonder what will happen with the merger, as it may help CLO, City Theatre, and the Public Theatre stay alive, albeit at the cost of jobs.
4 comments:
I think this is very interesting, especially since we have just done the Pittsburgh project about these different theaters and organizations. We had talked about the merger and the issue with money within some of the theatres. Now I am being provided with more information that wasn't so clear before. When choosing to go to a school in this industry, I knew that it was going to be hard because the theatre industry is hard. What I mean by that is two things. One hard to get work is very selective, but also hard to get work due to the issue occurring in Pittsburgh. The fact that these theaters may have to close or produce fewer shows is the reality of local theaters today. If the merger does occur, I wonder what changes would be made and how the dynamic of these theaters would change with it. It really is saddening to know that this is occurring and may continue to occur elsewhere due to the hardships within the industry.
Most regional theatres have relied on private donations for a long time. The private philanthropy has allowed many theatres to operate on a red budget for a long time. They spend more money than they bring in without these donations. This allows theatres to not have to put on shows that always guarantee a certain number of ticket sales by their popularity. These new works or underperformed shows bring greater diversity to theatre seasons that are very similar to each other. The lack of support from ticket sales and donations is likely due to the instability in the economy and wild swings in our political climate. Targeted attacks have been made against the little arts funding their way into political propaganda that only supports everything America does. This is also one of the markers of the start of a fascist government. A more stable, prosperous United States that supports all would help fund theatres around the country.
I was pretty surprised to hear to about the postponing of the decisions in regards to the possible merger, especially because the last thing I read about this from the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette in the article titled “On the brink of ‘financial failure,’ Pittsburgh’s three largest theaters explore a merger” was pretty certain on the decision being made this December. Something in the article that stood out to me was in an infographic laying out how a strong arts and theater scene supports the local economy. A statistic from that infographic that surprised me was that “20% of Park Point conservatory graduates remain in the city as tax-paying residents.” The infographic also mentioned how downtown businesses benefit from university enrollment as students buy from their local businesses. All in all I found it interesting how universities and higher education are so heavily integrated in the arts and theater scene as well as the local economy.
I wasn’t aware that Pittsburgh’s theatre scene was in such a declining circumstance. Upon my arrival to Pittsburgh, I was awed by how much theatre it seemed to have compared to Atlanta, which only had a handful of smaller theaters and one major house downtown (there may have been others that I was not aware of). But to know that it was dramatically bigger a decade ago is astonishing, and really conveys the urgency of the situation. And since the major theatres are hurting and cutting employees and budgets, what situation must the smaller houses be in? It’s also interesting to note how important Carnegie Mellon and the other universities are in Pittsburgh’s theatre economy, with many students and professors involved professionally. I do wonder what will happen with the merger, as it may help CLO, City Theatre, and the Public Theatre stay alive, albeit at the cost of jobs.
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