Post-Strike Space Crunch

For some shows, the start-up is worse than the strike! The overcrowding of delayed B'way openings that has now ensued in early December is forcing a crunch on not tickets, but media space.

Arts editors have already warned producers that because of the tight schedule, they won’t be able to run feature stories on productions like The Seafarer or August: Osage County, meaning the only press these plays will get will be critical reviews.

The horror!

Of course, editors could simply give more space to theatre.

Just kidding.

The Big Picture

From today's Riedel, once again excellently sourced:

The seeds of the showdown were planted more than 10 years ago, when a group of aggressive producers, appalled at the amount of money it cost them to put on a show, decided it was time to take on the unions one by one.

They launched their first attack in 2003 against the musicians. After a four-day strike, the producers were able to reduce - but not eliminate - the number of players they had to hire for a show.

Three years ago, they went after the actors in an attempt to reduce the cost of touring companies. There was no strike, but the negotiations were nasty and protracted.

On the sidelines, watching these clashes were the stagehands - the toughest union of all.

They knew they were next.

See a pattern?

Turns out a League-Equity "rematch" is on its way. That contract is up in just 6 months...

While They Were Striking...

Congrats to blogger George Hunka for making his way to the Guardian theatre blogs, for what looks like at least an occasional gig. Check out this post of his, where he is eager to reassure our friends across the pond that the Broadway strike hardly shut down the real American theatre.

Over the past few weeks I've been making my usual rounds of the off-off-Broadway theatres and the parties to which theatre artists are inevitably drawn, and within these two weeks I don't think I've heard one word about the strike uptown. Down here, it's business as usual: performances, hundreds of them each week, in theatres ranging from well-appointed performance arenas to grungy black-box theatres and basement spaces.

Indeed, downtown, life--and a lot of great work--has gone on. I admit to being somewhat singleminded about the strike the last few weeks. Honestly, I do think it's an important story informing how theatre--at least some theatre, the well-advertised kind--gets made in this country. But obviously it's not the whole story.

Truth is, when you blog as a hobby, and often have time for only one or two posts a day, you --okay, I--tend to post about what feels most urgent, immediately available. But enough defensiveness!

It is also true--as we've repeatedly seen the last few weeks--that the larger media's fixation (forget the blogosphere!) on the strike, while flattering they're paying attention at all, only served to reinforce that Broadway (esp. musicals a la Grinch)=American theatre. And we haven't seen major outlets like the Times take advantage the lull on the Rialto to shine the spotlight elsewhere. Yes, the Times covered some Off and Off-Off shows, but not more than usual it seemed. Not to mention encouraging Broadway ticket holders to go do some shopping instead of some Shopping & Fucking, as it were.

So let's make sure on this site we ignore this no longer! What shows did you see the past 19 days that were running that made you forget there ever was a Broadway?

I'll go first: Lulu at BAM (by Frankfurt's Thalia Theater); Adam Rapp's Bingo with the Indians at the Flea; Farquhar's 1699 The Constant Couple at The Pearl. Actually I had very mixed feelings about all 3. (And 2 of them were reviewing gigs I didn't choose.) But all of them were vital and alive evenings of theatre--created by artists under 40, I'll add--with tickets available for under $35.*

But I'm sure there were even better things going on. Tell us!

*Correction: I previously said "most tickets under $35, but I suppose that may not be technically true in all cases. In BAM just the Balcony, really (especially with a subscription). And the Pearl is only affordable in previews, unfortunately. (Given it's the Pearl....)

REVIEW: "The Constant Couple"

My review in Time Out today of a rare occasion: a Restoration comedy production that doesn't suck.

It's The Constant Couple, a 1699 hit by George (Recruiting Officer, Beaux Stratagem) Farquhar. Reportedly it was also the hit of the Restoration, setting all box office records until The Beggar's Opera surpassed it in 1728. Of course it didn't receive its NY premiere until...now.

Anyway it's no masterpiece, and no laugh-out-loud riot. And there are some hit or miss choices. But it's easily the best production of a classical play I've seen at the Pearl Theatre in a long, long time. (Before their promising foray into 20th Century US Drama last year I had almost given up on them.) Kudos to hiring a smart outside director, Jean Randich, to helm this one.

Post-Strike Round-Up

For video footage, check out NY1. Last night they had live post-handshake interviews, so hopefully they kept the footage.

Also: Variety. And Playbill, who also reports that surprisingly everyone, every single show, will be back up and running tonight! (Hopefully actors have been running lines the last few weeks. Anyone know the Equity stipulations on rehearsals during the strike?)

I must say, for once, the Times is better sourced today on the details than Riedel. Campbell Robertson gets the goods on some of the not-yet-for-public-release final terms:

But among the changes the league was able to achieve, according to officials involved in the talks, was a daily minimum of 17 stagehands on the load-in, the lengthy and costly period when a production is loaded into a theater. In the recently expired contract, producers would set a number of stagehands needed for a load-in — say, 35 — and all of them would have to stay every day for the entirety of the load-in, an arrangement that producers said often left large groups of stagehands with nothing to do.

The league was also able to gain an extra hour on the continuity call, the hour before or after a performance when stagehands perform duties related to that performance. In the old contract, any work that took longer than one hour required a minimum four-hour work call. In the tentative deal, stagehands can be called for two hours before a performance or for an hour before and after, though they would earn double for the hour after the show.

In return for these changes and others, union members would get yearly raises well above the 3.5 percent that the league had been offering.

So what we have here is clearly some major work-rule concessions from the union, despite the image of them being totally intractable. League prez Charlotte St. Martin may have even meant it when she announced last night, "“the contract is a good compromise that serves our industry.” One can only imagine some of these compromises were attainable weeks ago, when St. Martin was then calling the union totally indifferent to industry demands.

Other highlights:

Under the just in case you were wondering category:

The sides met for three long days at the law offices of Proskauer Rose, the firm representing the league, where they calculated the value of each other’s offers and went back and forth in old-fashioned horse trading to arrive at a series of wage increases that both sides could live with.

And, for the record:

The strike, the first in the union’s 121-year history, darkened 31 theaters, shuttering 27 shows and one Duran Duran concert, which moved elsewhere.

I know there's a Duran Duran joke there somewhere.

And, finally, I was tantalized by this aside at the bottom of Riedel & co.:

The producers lost at least $19 million, because theaters were dark during Thanksgiving, the second most profitable period for Broadway.

Wow. Lucky for that $20 million "strike fund" the producers had raised....Hey, wait a minute!

Strike Settled

as of 10:30 last night.

Over to Riedel.

Class Conflict ain't just for Off Stage

Broadway, chockablock with tourist trash, hasn't been a particularly hospitable environment for trenchant social vision lately. Blame it on the impossible cost of doing business, which has caused some to hold striking stagehands responsible. No parent should have to shell out 500 bucks to take the family to see a musical. But let's not kid ourselves into thinking that the producers of Mel Brooks' "Young Frankenstein," one of the nine Broadway shows left running, as Mammon would have it, will lower their premium ticket prices of $450 if they could get cheaper labor.

[...]

The game, in short, is broken on all ends. Still, when the salaries of stagehands, which admittedly seem high compared to those of measly journalists, are tossed around as evidence of union extortion, it's worth considering that few of these skilled workers could afford to live in one of the high-rises recently erected in the now-desirable Times Square-Hell's Kitchen neighborhood where they work.

-Charles McNulty, telling it like it is, in the LA Times.

The rest of his trenchant essay exhorts playwrights to take up the artistic challenge posed by
the strike: to actually tell the story on stage of the socio-economic upheavals going on off stage--i.e. in our real lives.

Strike's End in Sight

From the New York Post.


Riedel reports optimism today, as talks enter what could be their final round.
"It's down to money and one or two work-rule issues," one source said. "But there is definitely a deal here."
But don't assume they're all becoming friends now. The attacks still fly, but reason looks like (?) it may just prevail.

Here is the Post's own graphic outlining the final compromises. Keep in mind this is Murdoch's NY Post, but even so, this seems relatively fair, based on what I know. And Riedel's reporting on this has, to my mind, been utterly fair and balanced in the good way.

One producer's priceless parting shot:

"We've got more flexibility, though we'll probably still have to carry some guys who don't do very much," one producer says.

Yeah, I'm sure that's what they say when they job-in Huey Lewis for Chicago, too.

Press Release of the Day

As a Tom Waits fan, I don't know whether to be pleased or horrified by this new Guthrie studio show:

Warm Beer Cold Women, according to press notes, "lays out gritty truths like dirty laundry on the clothesline, with some rarely heard soliloquies laced in for his aficionados. For those unfamiliar with the bard of bum, the piece is a great introduction to some of Waits' best known works."

A Tom Waits jukebox musical. Never thought I'd live to see the day...

No Deal

At least, not yet.

Over to Crain's:

With no new talks scheduled as of Tuesday morning, Broadway performances through Wednesday’s matinées were canceled.

Broadway producers and the stagehands' union wound up another night of talks at 7:30 a.m. Tuesday without reaching a deal but officials say they have made some progress.

So the nail-biting continues. And probably no hope of struck shows resuming until this weekend at the earliest.

ADDENDUM: Robertson's NYT piece adds some minor news re: Grinch. Jujamcyn is giving up its appeal of the court injunction and letting the show run its course. Whew!

I say, at the earliest. Imagine, even if strike officially is over Thursday, how long it could take to get a show, a big show, up and running again after a two-week hiatus?

And once again, to repeat, the point of contention is no longer the load-in.

The Canon According to Mendes

BBC does the complete Shakespeare, again. This time with Sam Mendes in charge.

Nice to know Sam hasn't given up classical theatre entirely. Perhaps it's the perfect meld for him of his theatrical flair and movie savvy. Personally, I count myself a fan. But far more of his theatre work than films, at least so far.

Strike Talks Continue Tonight

The latest this morning from Campbell Robertson:

Talks in the Broadway strike were adjourned at 6.30 a.m. this morning between the league representing the theater owners and producers and the union representing the stagehands.

After negotiating through the night, the two sides announced that they would adjourn, and the union said they would meet again at 6.30 p.m. this evening.

Bruce Cohen, a spokesman for the union, said: “We are closer than we were twelve hours ago but not close enough to have a deal.”

Continued here.

Strike Talks Back On

No word as of late Sunday afternoon on the new round of strike negotiations. Perhaps tonight or tomorrow a.m. It's tempting to predict a settlement. But if it's gone on this long, why not a little longer, eh?

Meanwhile, if you can stand to read one more article about it all, then make it this one, tucked away in the Times Sunday Metro section. A fruitful collaborative piece between Campbell Robertson's nose-to-the-ground theatre reportage with Steven Greehnouse's incisive labor/business analysis.

Lots of detail, reminding us all once again this is about a lot more than the load-in "featherbedding" issue. There's the 4-hour overtime minimum, for instance, which the producers have also used to paint the stagehands as unreasonable. Maybe in a normal job. But did they think we forgot that working "overtime" on a Broadway show usually means working past 11pm?

One of the work rules that management is eager to change involves what is known as the continuity call. A continuity call happens when the stagehands who are working on a running show are called for an hour’s work before or after a performance to do work relating to that performance. Any work that goes beyond that hour requires a costly four-hour work call.

The league says it is wasteful to pay for a four-hour work call just because it had already called for an hour’s work before the performance. But Mr. Cohen said the four-hour work call makes sense because it discourages theaters from ordering stagehands to continue working until midnight or 1 a.m. For the many stagehands who supplement their income working day jobs like loading in other Broadway shows, setting up trade shows at hotels or working at other cultural institutions like Lincoln Center, late nights can be troublesome, he said.

“They want all this great flexibility after a performance,” Mr. Cohen said. “They want us to work one hour, two hours, three hours after a performance. We want to go home and make our train. We live in the suburbs, and we want to make the last train out of Penn Station, and they don’t seem to recognize that.”

No doubt (or, at least, I assume) the League is offering to increase the hourly overtime pay, so that one hour means more money than before. Still, as the union says, this about "discouraging" overtime. Maybe it would be better to speak the business jargon of the producers and call it a "disincentive."

Speaking of business jargon, imagine public reaction to this strike if we called the producer's stance what it is: downsizing. Sure it sounds like a no-brainer when the producers appeal to the sense of "no pay for no work." But when bosses come into other workplaces in America, and start reducing the workforce down to "essential employees," even if it means putting lifelong workers out of employment, I think the public is right to urge caution and moderation. And the League, looking at its balance sheets, is clearly in the mood to downsize Broadway as much as possible.

Funny enough, the expense of stagehand labor is hardly the biggest expense they have these days. And the League's insistence on keeping the strike going for the sake of a relatively small piece of the pie--relative to the stagehands' indispensability--is actually what's giving the stagehands their leverage. According to labor experts, at least.

Lois Gray, a professor of labor management relations at Cornell University, said the teachings of Alfred Marshall, the British economist, show that the roughly 350 stagehands who are on strike have a lot of bargaining leverage.

“The stagehands have classic bargaining power,” she said. “They’re essential to the production. They cannot be replaced in the short run, and they are a relatively small percentage of total costs. That puts them in a very strong position.”

In this way, she said, the stagehands are like airline pilots. A small number of workers can shut down an industry, and it rarely pays for management to endure a long strike because those workers represent only a small fraction of overall costs — and management can often pass the increased cost on to consumers. For Broadway producers, the cost of the stagehands’ labor is far outweighed by the cost of advertising and theater rent.

Ha! But you won't see the strike blamed on stratospheric ad rates. At least not in the pages of the New York Times...

Baitz vs Isherwood, and all that is implied

"The Times critics present themselves as advocates for consumers, and not as advocates for the theater itself... I suggest that [they] re-read Tynan, for instance, who was funny and could be ruthless, but was always on the side of the artist, and never innocently hid behind the pretense of being in the hire of the cultural wing of Consumer Reports."

-Jon Robin Baitz, blogging on HuffingtonPost.

I think I'm one of the last theatre geeks to finally get to this terrific invective by Robbie Baitz that he posted last week on Huffington. (Where he's regular blogger. You can subscribe to his feed here.) But here's a pretty mainstream playwright--and now Hollywood/TV writer--making a very blogger-esque argument.

I mean, you think you've seen anti-Isherwood tracts here? Try Robbie. His piece is inspired by a something Isherwood wrote earlier this month, calling for strike-sidelined theatre exiles to return East. As a reminder of the bi-coastal divide of our dramatic talent it was welcome. But its deductions and prescriptions were highly suspect.

First, there was the already cliched use of Clifford Odets as the ultimate Hollywood sell-out. As an Odets scholar I thought maybe just me and the other two would care. But thankfully Baitz sets the record straight on that one:

In fact, Mr. Odets, far from being hooked on the money, had given so much of it away to the Group Theater, et al over the years, that he had very little choice but to turn to Hollywood. Particularly after he grew ever so slightly cold in the eyes of the fickle New York critics. He had children to bring up, and that cost money then as it does now. (Mr. Isherwood, whom I do not dislike at all , has, I note with a degree of idleness, no such obligations, as far as I know.)

Um, I'll refrain from explicating that last parenthetical. Just keep in mind Baitz himself is an openly gay man. Also keep in mind that Baitz conducted a very moving interview with the publicity shy Walt Odets (the playwright's son) in the Lincoln Center Theatre Review for their Awake and Sing production, where the sadness of the Hollywood years are poignantly brought out.

Baitz is worth reading in full, so if you haven't yet, do so. It even made Riedel's column today, reporting on the dust-up, with some implied responses from the Ish himself. Also quoted, backing Baitz up, is fellow bicoastal playwright Warren Leight:

"Charles Isherwood asking playwrights to return to the stage is kind of like Ted Bundy wondering why no one hitchhikes anymore."

And you thought bloggers had it in for the guy!

Okay, so playwrights don't like critics. What's new, you ask? Well, I may be reading too much into this, but I sense a kind of "critical mass" is now building around not just the Times second-string critic, but the overall coverage of theatre at said paper.

I've heard bloggers incessantly criticized for resorting too easily (and often) to Times-bashing. Fair point. And rather than fixate on offending details in the prose of Mssrs Brantley and Isherwood, I prefer to shine the light on the editors above them who call the shots: namely arts editor Sam Sifton and theatre editor Rick Lyman.

Now I do agree it's pointless to try to shame or lecture the Times into better coverage. Hey, they're a business and they have their reasons for doing what they do, not what bloggers like me would want them to do. But if I do have an agenda in my indulgence in "media criticism" with them, it is to do my little part in chipping away at this false mantle they're erected as "the arbiter of culture." So many--so, so many--New Yorkers and culture-loving people around the country really do still look to that paper as the authority on theatre. It's really still true. It's probably based on those days past when they were a little more convincing an "arbiter." But now that the theatre as a whole--as an artform--is not being well served by the paper, it is incumbent upon anyone who cares to steer readers who care elsewhere. It is indeed time to call out: The Grey Lady has no clothes.

What's compounding this increased feeling of exasperation is yet another(!) Isherwood column pre-Thanksgiving. Assigned (presumably) to guide readers on theatrical alternatives to strike-shuttered Broadway, rather than use his precious space to champion artists Off and Off-Off the average Times reader's radar, he basically (albeit humorously) suggested you're better off people-watching at Trader Joe's. I'm not exaggerating.

I'll leave it to the passionate Isaac Butler to call this for what it was: an insult. But I can't decide to whom--to the theatre, or the reader?

While Isaac has now had it with the man and basically argues the prosecution for his removal, I again prefer to focus on the bigger editorial approach. I have no doubt Isherwood (and Brantley, too, for that matter) are doing exactly the job they are being paid for. Hence the one line of Isaac's I agree most with:

It seems that only theatre that can afford advertising in the Times' pages has any value to most of its reviewers.

Case in point. Today's Arts, Briefly section (emphasis on the "briefly") offered what could charitably be called a concession to the protests against Isherwood's blowing off of alternative theatre in favor of alternatives to theatre, as well as to their general failure to take advantage of the strike to--in the immortal words of the Times--"remember the needy" when it came to theatre. (I myself last week proposed they "send Brantley to the Brick, and Isherwood to Inwood" but alas my call was not heeded.) So finally, the rest of the community gets some props:

Off Off Broadway Offerings

Despite the stagehands’ strike, there are dozens of theater options available for those willing to venture farther off Broadway. Among them are the Amoralists’ production of “The Pied Pipers of the Lower East Side” (theamoralists.com) at the Gene Frankel Theater and the Actors Company Theater’s (tactnyc.org) revival of “The Runner Stumbles” by Milan Stitt. There’s also a one-night-only gay play festival, “Instant Play Insanity,” at the Wings Theater on Christopher Street tomorrow (wingstheater.com). Five short plays will be written, cast and rehearsed in the 24 hours before showtime at 8 p.m. Other options are listed at unitedstages.com and nyitawards.com/oobshows, most with ticket prices of $20 or less.

What do you make of this account of what's happening Off Off? Would this be the selection of titles that would first come to your mind? Notice two of the productions are "one night only." Frankly these titles seem to me chosen purely as personal/professional favors to the pr reps of these particular shows. Or else conforming to some typical middlebrow view of what Off Off Broadway was in the 60s (i.e. where they do those "gay" plays).

I'm all for giving a shoutout to NY Innovative Theatre Awards, but picking unitedstages over NYTheatre.com? Clearly not an informed choice. (Also notice the gesture of: we don't really know what's going on Off Off, so just go look on the web somewhere.)

In this context, I must say I'm very thankful for Brantley's apparently personal commitment to promoting Richard Maxwell's career. Otherwise an opening as exciting to downtowners as "Ode to the Man Who Kneels" might never have been reviewed at all! (Or, like Adam Rapp's latest, relegated to a Saturday review.)

The bottom line, of course, is...the bottom line. Isaac is absolutely right to tie the apparent policies here to advertising revenue. It's not just that direct, but the ethos in the paper's pages are more commercial (or simply celebrity-driven) than ever. This all reflects conscious editorial policy, I believe. If there's been one obvious change in the Times over the last five or six years it has been a very conspicuous targeting of a wealthier readership. Note all the new sections added to the print edition: "Escapes," "Dining In" and "Dining Out." Now do you actually read those sections, or like me do you file them directly into recycling under "can't afford that"? The dirty little secret of these innovations (ok, not so secret) is it's not about the content, it's about the ads. NYT sells ad space in such "premium" supplements (what Colbert calls "Gold Edition") for a bundle, on the promise of delivering upper-income-bracket eyes.

It's a sensible move from a business standpoint. The Newspaper business is in crisis. NYT's strategy has become pure, naked snob appeal. Or not even "snob" (that implies taste)--just rich. You see it on the front pages (more stories about high-end shopping and Ivy League colleges than ever) and in the arts. In the internet age when anyone can read NYT content for free, the only people left subscribing to the dead-tree version will be those with money to burn. (Especially now that TimesSelect imploded.)

Has it always been thus? I guess so. But as a native New Yorker, I can honestly say I remember a time when regardless of the Times' privileged status, any New Yorker felt they could pick up the paper and find something for them. Now I'm not so sure of that.

Yes, the playwright always will be the natural enemy of the critic. But I take Baitz at his word that what he wants is not just a nicer critic, but a critic--nay, a newspaper--that actively engages with the theatre as a living artform. Not just nostalgically waxes for simpler times, or reduces it to a consumer service. Bad reviews would be more palatable and less destructive to the profession if it were accompanied by coverage that aggressively supports the endeavor of theatre, on all levels. That supports it against the taint of consumerism, as opposed to confirm such anti-theatrical prejudices. That challenges the reader to broaden beyond Broadway.

Of course, the time that a newspaper could do that profitably (and with support from corporate headquarters) is coming to an end. And so I say: Welcome to the blogosphere, Robbie Baitz! I hope others will join you out here.

REVIEWS: "Bingo with the Indians" & "Rebel Voices"

Need a break from turkey and/or family today?

Then check out not one, but two bite-sized reviews of mine in this week's Voice and Time Out:

Adam Rapp's Bingo with the Indians and the Culture Project's Rebel Voices.

Let's just say that of the two, the first is more "rebellious" and the latter more bingo-family-friendly.

Happy Football Day to all.

How the Grinch Stole Thanksgiving

...from the League of American Theatres and Producers, that is.

While some (me included!) were hastily declaring the Grinch producers had no right to settle privately with the stagehands union and re-open without permission of their theatre owners, the Jujamcyns...A NY State Surpreme Court judge(!) has ruled otherwise.

Breaking news from New York 1:

"I'm going to grant the injunction,” state Supreme Court Justice Helen Freedman said Wednesday. "I think one Grinch in town in enough."

A sense of humor, Your Honor.

Well, the League isn't laughing. Not only is the break in ranks bad pr, but the little green goblin is about to run off with a bunch of the Thanksgiving holiday stash! There being little competition and all...

Turned out the Grinch's ace in the hole was not just the argument that they were uniquely affected due to their announced limited holiday-season run. Ironically it was that crazy 12-15 performance/week union exemption contract the show negotiated back in 2006! Thanks to that, they were able to claim separate party status, or something.

The key, of course, was that the union agreed to treat the Grinch differently. (Just like the Disney and nonprofit theatres.) Which was smart pr on their part.

What this decision means for the union is leverage. It's a war of attrition now, and the union just proved they can wait it out longer, especially now that a few less tourists will be accusing them of ruining their family show experience. And the producers' losses just theoretically increase every time their potential customers buy a consolation ticket to The Grinch.

Such leverage is important going into a weekend when the two sides were supposed to meet on Sunday. That was the plan, at least, until Riedel reported today that the League was sending signals they have nothing to talk about unless the union is willing to settle. I imagine the union feels a little less pressure now. We'll see if the League decides to show up Sunday after all.

In other news, the Nederlanders--remember them? the theatre owners/producers who technically have a separate contract with the stagehands and thus originally signalled they might not be a party to the strike but then were?--the same Nederlanders are suing, yes suing Local 1 stagehands union. For $35 mil of damages in lost ticket sales. Total bluff, if you ask me.

The Jujamcyns said they're appealing the injunction decision by the way. Of course they won't get a hearing until next week--after Grinchey rakes in a bucketload this weekend.

Strike Quotes: Day 10

“The league kept saying for two days, ‘Keep giving us more, keep giving us more.’ We modified or agreed on 9 or 10 things over two days, and we got nothing.”
-James J. Claffey Jr., president of Local 1.

“At the very end, we gave them what we thought was our very bottom line.”
-Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of the League of American Theatres and Producers.

Also...

“A lot of people think all of Broadway is closed."
-Chris Boneau of the nonprofit Manhattan Theatre Club, explaining why the Broadway survivors are still not seeing much of an uptick. Too hard to explain, I guess.

What They're Still Fighting Over

Campbell Robertson explains why the strike marches on:

According to people involved with the negotiations on both sides, the league and the union had found common ground on the rules that apply to the load-in, the lengthy period when shows are moving into theaters. But Local 1 did not agree [on Sunday night] to the league’s proposed changes to the rules governing shows that are up and running.

In the recently expired contract, stagehands could be called for one “continuity hour” to do work before or after a show; any extra work beyond that required a four-hour work call. The producers had made various proposals to loosen this requirement.

The league had also been trying to change rules that limited the kind of work stagehands are allowed to do during certain work calls. A package of proposed raises was contingent on how much flexibility the league achieved.

Repeat: it's not about the load-in anymore.

On Feeds & Feedburner

Note to anyone gracious enough to "subscribe" to a Playgoer via RSS or other "feeds."

I now with Feedburner. So if you need to, you can adjust your sets to: http://feeds.feedburner.com/ThePlaygoer.

We thank you for your support.

(Since I'm still pretty much web-illiterate myself, sorry I won't be able to guide you through any tech difficulties myself. All they said was post that link.)

The Grinch Story...

...is getting hilarious.

At least in Riedel's telling today.

Turns out, the producers who tried to get their own dispensation from the union to reopen the show? Totally had no authority to do so. Not without the ok of the Jujamcyn company who owns the theatre, and is still very much a party to the strike.

A source close to Jujamcyn said the company, whose other theaters have been shut down by the strike, would not allow the union to use “The Grinch" to score a victory.

Thing is, the union already wins that one. Now both they and the Grinch people can point the finger at Jujamcyn and the League for shutting the kids out of Whoville.

I don't doubt the union already knew all this, though, when "agreeing" to take down the Grinch picket line. Surely they know who they're up against.

And I guess it shouldn't be surprising that the League is really circling the wagons here, and sees the Grinch team as basically interlopers--dropping into town during the peak season with their 12 shows a week, stealing away "family entertainment" business from all the other shows. Don't be surprised to see Grinch show up next year at Madison Square Garden, or Jersey, or some other "nonconventional venue."

Meanwhile, further negotiations have been set for Sunday.