It’s an issue that’s bothered me for some time, specifically since the First National Performing Arts Convention that took place in Pittsburgh in 2004. I was there reporting on the convention for a newspaper and, at many of the workshops, heard discussions about how nonprofits were having to explore for-profit-style ways of earning income because  – and this is even more the case now – there were no longer enough private grantors and donors or government funding sources to keep all the organizations alive. 

Many, such as orchestras and opera companies, had been doing this for a long time, making commercial recordings that earned them revenue for years afterward. Dance troupes were beginning to think about it, too.

The only performing discipline that apparently couldn’t plan to take advantage of this source of income was professional theater. And that’s because the stage actors’ and stage managers’ own union forbade the making and distributing of recorded stage performances. 

The original idea behind this, I gather, was to prevent artists and their work from being exploited by the mass media – i.e., denied pay for their own recorded work – and also to protect the vital live quality of stage performance that keeps at least some people buying tickets to theater productions. It seems Equity didn’t want America to be able to see plays performed on TV, because it was thought that if stage shows could be accessed there by everyone for free, no one would come to the theater anymore.

This is a position still held by some professional theater artists, I find. Even the unionized Norwegians subscribe to it. Or did. I have to say I think it’s outmoded. And I don’t think I’m alone: In recent discussions with theater artists around the nation, I’ve detected a rueful kind of resignation – numbers of them really wish they could record and sell their productions, but don’t think Equity is going to budge.   

It was an e-mail I received today from Minneapolis’s Guthrie Theater that got me wondering again why Equity doesn’t change its mind. The message announced that, through the NT Live  broadcast series, a live stage version of Phedre produced by Britain’s National Theatre would be screened twice at the Guthrie as a high-definition re-broadcast on July 8 and 9 (and as a re-broadcast or live simulcast on other dates at other selected stage theaters across the U.S.).

Now, why can the National Theatre do this mass-media thing apparently without danger, but American theaters have to be protected from it? 

National Theatre Director Nicholas Hytner, who is also directing Phedre, says in a release, “The NT Live events are designed to bring what we do on the stages of the National Theatre to a far greater number of people than we would ever be able to reach otherwise. Through high-definition broadcasts, we have the technology at our disposal to present our productions beyond the four walls of the National, to reach passionate theatre-goers all over the world, and to do it really well.”  

Do Equity members disagree with that?

To me, the pros of selling recorded shows appear far greater than the cons. First and most obviously, the better-known theaters could make a lot more money and the lesser-known theaters could make at least a little more money and also raise their profiles. Second, all theaters could reach global markets made up of people who will never be able to get to most of the in-theater performances in faraway places, but might yearn to see the work of companies they’ve heard about – theaters’ followings and paying audiences would grow and their likelihood of survival would increase. Third, safeguards could be put in place to protect theaters from losing audiences that could actually come to see the live shows on stage – how about releasing the DVDs only after the run of the production or tour has ended?  Four, to paraphrase The King and I, might Equity not be protecting actors out of all they own by refusing to adapt contracts so union members could get residuals from recorded work? I mean, the film industry does it – why can’t theater do it, too, and let its artists make better livings? 

And five, a lot more great productions would be preserved instead of lost, providing unique artistic, entertainment and educational experiences to countless numbers of people who otherwise would never get to benefit from them.  

It might be a bit painful for the theater industry to go through the thinking, negotiation and adjustment periods necessary to get a policy and new contracts in place, but unions are adapting to changing member needs and industry circumstances all the time. It took a while, but symphony orchestras and the musicians’ union finally got around to dealing with streaming performances on the Internet. 

Finally and most obviously, if the likes of the National Theatre and New York’s Metropolitan Opera can find ways to get their work to the world through mass media, there has to be a way for American theaters to do the same.

Or does Equity really want most of its members not to be working in their field full time and most theaters to be in constant danger of closing?