Archives do not equal salable creative goods

Reader Richard Ingraham makes a worthwhile point in his comment on my post of  June 19  about the issue of  recording live professional-theater performances. He notes that, though Actors Equity Association does largely prevent  stage plays from being recorded for sale (as do some rights-holders of those plays), most professional productions can be recorded for archival purposes. He writes:    

“… I would add that most contracts allow for archival recordings to be created, this is especially true of original works for theatre. So performances are rarely lost forever, at least the ones that are new works. Most of the original productions I’ve worked on have had some type of archival taping. In fact I’m pretty sure the NYC library has a spot you can go and view the archival video tape of many shows.”

In fact, the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts located at Lincoln Center does provide this service. Here’s the description of the facility from the Lincoln Center site:

About the Library for the Performing Arts

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts houses the world’s most extensive combination of circulating, reference, and rare archival collections in its field. Its divisions are the Circulating Collections, Jerome Robbins Dance Division, Music Division, Billy Rose Theatre Division, and the Rodgers and Hammerstein Archives of Recorded Sound. The materials in its collections are available free of charge, along with a wide range of special programs including exhibitions, seminars, and performances. An essential resource for everyone with an interest in the arts—whether professional or amateur—the Library is known particularly for its prodigious collections of non-book materials such as historic recordings, videotapes, autograph manuscripts, correspondence, sheet music, stage designs, press clippings, programs, posters and photographs. The Library sponsors orientation programs tailored for graduate school and professional training students each term, and offers internships for museum, library, and archival students.

It’s great that records of live shows survive somewhere. But while the existence of these archives is important and valuable to the public, it’s beside the point that I was trying to make, which is:  The theater companies and artists creating these performances should be able to benefit financially from the sale of their own recorded work. Recordings represent a huge untapped resource for struggling nonprofit and for-profit theater organizations and it seems quite wrong for the union and others to prevent theaters from earning desperately needed income from their own productions. Doesn’t the union exist to ensure that its members earn a decent living? Wouldn’t the rights-holders of plays earn money from recordings, too?  

Yes and yes. Since the film industry has long ago worked out how to provide residual compensation to all the writers, actors, directors, technical staff and lord know how many others who work on film productions, I have to assume that the professional-theater industry could do it, too, if everyone involved just decided to bring about the needed legal changes. It would certainly be a lot of work, as Ingraham rightly stresses, but it could also make an enormous difference to the economic survival rate of stage companies and stage artists.

Wouldn’t that be worth the effort? Ingraham and I agree on that third yes.